A Piece Of Myself... And For Myself Poem by RIC BASTASA

people in my place worry about me
why i do not worry about next year
the next planting season after this year's bumpy harvest where every room in the house is filled with corn.

people in my place ask me where shall i live after next year
and you should soon inherit the house that i built for 50 years.

they all worry about me with all those particular items like what shall happen
to the glasses in my cabinet
or the white car in my blue garage
or my gold watch and my silver spoons and my china plates

they worry about my gold fish in my aquarium
who shall feed them when i am no longer home

people worry a lot about me
and i begin sometimes when i get tired listening to all the questions
asking: why me? why do you worry all about me?

i am not even dead yet and have no plans retiring from life's works
like the arts and this
pottery and this poetry

people worry about me
and never about us.

i am tired and all i need is sleep.
and i do not worry at all.

because i know that if i am dead
then i am dead
and i do not ask for more

not even on extended dreams
not even on anything

perhaps they worry about me because they all worry about themselves
perhaps i am their mirror
or perhaps they think that with my behavior
i should not have lived
in the first place.