Bury Me In The Backyard

The wags always say, “Send me flowers while I’m alive.”

So in that spirit I thought I’d write you an elegy

A tribute to you while you’re still alive

But then I changed my mind

You’ve always been full of yourself

Why should I add fuel to the tank?

But since I intended to write an elegy

I’m in that frame of mind

I’ve always been the tidy sort, you know that

My possessions are pretty well-documented

They go to you and my parents as in the will

You can give some to my friends

The rest can go on eBay--make some money

Garage sales, auctions, thrift stores for the rest

Find them all happy homes, let nothing go to waste

In fact, if you want, you can stuff my body

Put it in the corner, maybe have me reading a book

That’s pretty much all I did while I was alive

If that’s too grotesque then bury me

I grew up across the street from a graveyard

I liked to play there as a child

Yeah, a cemetery would be all right

But you could also bury me in the backyard

You might need a special permit from the city

You know the government always has to get their cut

I don’t want any embalming

None of that stuff polluting the ground

I want to go back to nature

I want to feed the worms

I bet you’d get a really good garden the next year

Maybe the tomatoes would taste like me

And if a dog ever dug up a leg bone

Don’t get mad, let it have a chew

Make sure to put a tag or something on me

So no one gets freaked out fifty years from now

Thinking there was a murder

You can put a headstone if you want

But I don’t want no stinking coffin

Maybe one of those biodegradable bags

You could have friends dig the grave

Some of them could use the exercise

I don’t want to stay there forever though

Someday I hope my skull ends up on a shelf

Maybe a college student’s somewhere

I’d visit if I could from time to time

Offer advice, or just rattle my teeth

Yeah, yeah, don’t be sad

We can’t just keep getting older

The Earth is too crowded as it is

Death is a friend after all

Invite it in, have a drink

Enjoy the times while you’re here

Oops, this is turning into a carpe diem poem

Anyway, when I’m gone, don’t let me be a pain

Flowers, funeral directors, rent on the gravesite

Just dig a hole and bury me in the backyard

True, it might affect the property value

But then goths and the morbid might pay extra

And I’d still always be at the family bar-b-qs