For this poem, I used the title of a poem by May Swenson (1913-1988), a US poet of
Swedish descent.
Single worm,
now multiplying daily
in a dense green plastic dome
of kitchen waste,,
devouring vegetation,
feeding
on the sweat of leaves,
ingesting their fibre,
offloading rich humus,
and transforming carbon.
Avarice is their secret,
These writhing pink clusters,
trapped beneath a humming lid,
where odour and heat
oscillate like steam in the dark.
All those welded knots of
wise worms,
fattening
towards death,
so organic waste
can reinvent
as garden mulch.
Barbara Lawton