Ode to maggots.

Fearless I and often called

to capture, not kill, creeping creatures
and not one of them did I abhor
until I first saw maggots.

In dark, dirty places bred by flies
heat-hatched in rotten flesh.
The wriggling mass once realised
filled me with pure revulsion.

They spilled off the bag onto the floor
and moved with speed toward my feet
with grotesqueness only they can have
pus-white, rice-like, fat on meat.

Carrion eaters, coffin companions
putrefaction's little messengers
showing me in their slimy minions
my fear of my mortality.

I gasped in fear felt in my gut
and leapt about my feet up high
imagining maggots on my body
quelling panic, the urge to cry.

I wished they'd simply go away
my bravery had been defaced.
The urge to kill them, maim, destroy
overcame my sense of reason.

I steeled myself to act against them
exterminate the vile, vile things.
All in vain, I could not face them
my nemesis found, my feet grew wings.

Mel Gouws 14/02/2001