Digging for Earthworms

*Written for day 22 of the PAD challenge. Prompt: an "earth" poem (for earth day).

digging for earthworms I do
not think of the tectonic
plates shifting, the molten
magma center of this earth,
but of the errands to be
run, the telephone calls
dialed, the dinner, now
defrosting on the counter, to
be somehow assembled

I do not think of those
others who have walked here,
leaving the ground undisturbed,
as we tear through the sod
to blackness below, or of
the fossil remains we may
yet find

the afternoon post brings
more demands, the calendar,
like clockwork, presents us
with the first and last
of the month, the curious
pressing scripts so easily
ignored (for a moment) in
favor of these earthworms,
tangling-thick, working the
earth in their own slow way