Go flaccidly amid the soil and waste,
consuming all, returning all to earth
with conscientious pride. Relinquish haste -
for slow processes you were given birth.
Nor envy those with legs and wings and eyes
whose dissipation brings but scant reward.
Your purity of passion yields a prize
they cannot fathom. Here below the sward
yours is the freedom to descend at will
far from the baleful gaze of sun and moon
where light itself is blind and all is still
save for your smooth insinuations. Soon
the superficial world will pass as dust
into your calm domain, as all things must.
