WEDNESDAY 11th FEBRUARY 2009.

Death fled the field as men forgot to fear him
And their corpseless crop propagated the cosmos;
Defiling life wherever met, and bettering it,
And finalizing settlements to soothe lost trenches,
Whilst the reaper was left the husks of abandoned
Animals to collect until remorse overcame him.

He wandered his boneless home half hoping for
A human soul to brandish a calcareous digit at
And condemn for their wanton and rapacious
Ways, but all he found was sinless alien fibre
That once enlivened the farthest stars and fell
After the march of man brought utter mindlessness.

For an age the same as time spent sequencing
Creation’s chart the shadow land was rid of man,
And barren though it was it sighed itself relief,
And the mighty river of the boatman flowed
A little slower and sweetened soil where it once
Sped on after offloading bitter hopeless wretches,

And as the cloaked accountant unrobed himself
For the first time he breathed his last breath upon
A bed set by the Ferryman. And, as Death laid
Himself to rest, the creatures of the universe,
Usurped by greedy people, gathered round to wish
Him safe across the Styx before it froze for good.