Introduction to the Poet:
Sabeet Raza is a poet and aspiring author based in Pakistan. He is also associated with Ashvamegh Magazine.
Anatomies of Dying Beings
The gross odour of a dying man
Is not so gross itself
What is worse
Is that
of a rotting one
And
To rot
One must die first
Unfortunately, not a lot of us know death
We assume
Presume
And resume
We don’t ponder
We aren’t skeptics
We just assume
What death is
The gross odour does not come
from a corpse
They are buried long before they rot
It comes from the man
or the woman,
or just a wretched being
That dies alive
One
Or two
or as many as you can count
because so many there are
Who forgot to seize the day
And to profess his love to that fay
also the ones who let their deadlines pass
amongst the ones who said “tomorrow!”
just like
the procrastinators
the haters
the envious
analogic to the weaker lion
who gets ripped and eaten
sometimes even by prey
but this time
By time
The gross odour of a rotting man
Is not so gross itself
For he is buried
before he rots
It is the odour of a man rotting
while he lives
sorry, no- he exists
solely
without purpose and effort
and even an attempt
whose odour in truly unbearable.