The Closing Of A Discarded Wicker Picnic-Basket Poem by Mark Heathcote

This life is like a picnic basket.
Without the honeyed, glazed ham or the cheeseboard
without the scenic landscape.
But it does contain the unwelcome hoard.
And the obligatory sword and knife in the back.
That rose gingham tablecloth with the bloodied nap
rolled into a family hatchback, taken on a wild safari
after which there's no coming back?
Life is the primal force behind every death.

It's a quarter piece of dried-up lemon cheesecake.
No one wants it, but it's all we have left.
When autumn enters winter
and all the children have flown,
we're either widowed or heartbreakingly left alone.
And neither partner is talking.
And, in the end, it is just one last quiet elapsing
the closing of a discarded wicker picnic basket
maggots around an old chicken bone.