What Will I Do When I’m Dead?

I died when I was 89. The world seemed old and
I was glad to go. Time to move on,
do some traveling. So
I picked up my symbolic skirts and headed west.
Circled the world twice, spent years
in the same canyon, watched the mountains fall,
the seas run dry. Swam in hot lava.
At Christmas hung my molecules
from the aurora borealis. When that got old
I headed for the moon,
danced over craters, stayed up late
for earthrise. But moon beasts are slow,
and their popcorn tastes like asteroids.
Soon I packed my bones,
headed for Neptune and parts unknown,
of which the universe has a lot. I had no idea.
And out at the edge of the universe
where space and time curve,
there’s a cute little supernova bar
where the black holes hang out.
I always stop there on my rounds,
and although they want me to stay I say
I’m only passing through.
At a thousand years I was embarrassed by my age
but I’ve been around a lot since then
and know how relative things can be.
I’ll be 30 million years old next year,
and when the Horsehead Nebula invites me to dine
I’ll flirt and say I’m only 29.