I looked at the corpse, dead, broken
Wrinkled fingers that once touched rice
Worn out soles that treaded on stones
Marked by pieces of glass hidden by skin
His eyes stared into a ghastly space
A thousand moments captured timelessly
A cow, a deer, a snake slithering
His daughter, his wife and his house
His hands are frozen in the spasm of threat
The dirt beneath his nails from the soil he dug
The wrinkles on his palm travelling spaces of thought
And his fingers longing the touch of another
His lungs have expanded in desperation
His heart in the moment of life
And when all blood stood still in his veins
His lips parted in acceptance
I draw line on his body with my scalpel
Eager to learn what he is teaching me
Knowledge bleeds out and along with it
My breath fills his listless life
My fingers cringe at the touch of his skin
As though each touch transfers to me
A shadow of his forgotten life
Now waiting to be explored by the tears of my knife
He had learnt the wayward of life
And I had the simplest of them all
A scalpel, a book, a body
And the rich experience of existing