Michael Palmer

1943 / Manhattan, New York City, New York

Last Request

Bury me in a cocoa pod, it's time.
Bury me in a Mercedes Benz, a
silver one, I've met my end.
Bury me in a lobster shell, a

carapace of red, now I'm dead.
Bury me in a jet marked KLM,
a typewriter labeled Remington,
a stove-in boat, symbol of my clan.

Bury me in a pot of India ink,
only place that I can think.
Bury me in a skull in Voronezh
that dreams of dragonflies

and the spider's web, heaped
hills of human heads, since I'm dead.
Bury me in a can of flammable film
with Keaton (Buster) and Beckett (Sam).

Bury me in Little Boy and in Fat Man,
plunging toward the edge of time.
A cuckoo clock, a block
of bluest ice. Quincunx, Devil's Trill,

or 22 June, Town Hall, '45.
Lay me beside her in the Song of Songs,
our limbs forever intertwined,
now that I'm not alive.

Or plant me with the poets in an opium pipe,
its glowing ring of light.

Stick me in the ground
without a thought without a sound.
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