Shells of Humanity

Looming upon the arrival of Death’s withered hand,
the rancid smell of decaying flesh
decomposing into the ground - a shell of humanity;
empty of all that makes it alive:
warmth, love, hate, jealousy -
now gone from the world of the living
and left to fertilize the earth
upon which the jade grass grows,
the willow tree bends,
the flower unfurls in sheer beauty,
paradoxically living above the death below.
The circle of life, feared for its ambiguity,
revered for its formidable power,
and accepted as the one certainty in life.
Vulnerable in its susceptibility to the ravages of time,
that, to the ancient mountains ascending to the heavens, it leisurely erodes,
but to man, it reeks havoc.  Watching the descent,
walking hither and thither amid the rest of the walking dead
till we are buried within the soil
with only other empty shells to keep company;
stolen away, our souls - it is the recreation of the gods,
that sit upon their mountain and peer through the mists that envelop,
watching us fleeting mortals erect monumental endeavors
for their omnipresent greatness.
Erecting monumental endeavors for them all,
save one -
whom, with our death, his work begins.