mudgun

peel earth like
smooth giant brown fingernails
the severed surfaces are almost shiny
ming vase shiny
cracking only when the weight
and the angle of the sheet
betrays it.

the soil,
such that it is,
demands working.
nothing grows in the earth
that hasn't been turned
and folded over
and mixed in with itself.
space is necessary,
even where the sun doesn't shine,
space between the molecules,
space between atoms.

it's a principle of the universe,
really.
and, like it or not,
someone uses the mudgun on me
when i least suspect
finding my bones
and my other fictions of solidity
peeling my layers away
so that something else,
weeds, maybe
or maybe the next great gold harvest
can grow.