Wild Origin

Seeking your will,
instead we found, somehow,
a clutch of our own documents;
folded under a rubber band gone to rot,
muddy strands nestled in the creases.

Funny to see something so man-made,
so practical and mundane,
reduced to wild origin:
these strips, like bark,
from the tree it was sapped from;
these specks, like dirt,
from soil that tree stood in.

In the dark of your departure,
it's hard not to think about
when we go back to the earth.
When we are reduced to our parts.

You chose otherwise;
sought the flame.

Instead, you will ascend,
flutter, like our fraying papers
given to the wind.