NOT AS I FOUND IT

If I died tomorrow exactly at noon,

I could almost say I left the world as I found it.

(I was once its savior when I was born,

As every child is when he is born—)

If I died tomorrow exactly at noon

I could almost say I left the world as I found it.

Except, well, I did pick a flower yesterday,

From a stalk which was growing to buds at once

“A Siamese twin of the floral world.”

And dropped the flower somewhere I was walking,

But when next it snows on the place where I dropped it—

when Nature next dusts for fingerprints—

Two of my own will be on the stem:

An evidence for use to indict or defend me.

For use to indict my presence on the earth,

Or for use to defend my presence on the earth.

But, still, I wish to leave a bigger print, a thumb

Or finger trace across a city, or a culture, or a soul.

And leave the World not as I found it.