062717c

On worm world, everything is made of, or from, worms. This is not all to the good, but plumbing and water treatment occur simultaneously, as the pipes clean anything out of the water they can catch, for their own sustenance. An important downside: if you flush very much poison down the drain, even your pipes may die. You may replace them, but worms talk, and they remember. If you don't treat your pipes right, you may never get clean water again.

010317b

worm people

dine al fresco

take special pleasure from eating seafood

all are bisexual

suicides never cut themselves

don’t build on floodplains

111316b

There was a young worm from Toledo
Twas cursed with excessive albedo
Its tail was so bright
Even by night
That brazen young worm from Ohio

080316

We call them worms


No teeth, of course
No creatures slimy hereabouts
But still, peristaltic crawlers
Eyeless, noseless, nearly mouthless

Divide them; they reproduce
Their bodies form letters
"Welcome to our world"
We called them worms.

061416

centimeter worms

sleeker and more fuel efficient

inchworms didn't have a prayer

060516c

Segmented Worm Defense League

So many enemies;

bird, vole, salamander,

angler, captain of industry,

cruelly misnamed worm snake,

and the burrowers from within:

bacterium, protist, fungus;

they need protectin’!

They meet regularly,

dream of dominion,

pass resolutions,

raid fishing holes,

picket garden fences,

swap genetic material.

Maybe the league itself

is in segments.

(one for grass raising,

one for nematode relations,

one predator, one prey,

bylaws and soil amendments,

and so on)

and has no prejudice

against the worms that are

undivided wholes.

--

From my latest speculative-poetry chapbook, SETI Hits Paydirt, published by Popcorn Press. Available from the publisher and from Amazon.