Not Dead Yet

Light!
A single beam of dazzling sun
A puff of cool, clean air in the haze
Claw and scrabble even faster
With this release in sight

Dig faster, fighting to escape
Leave behind the silk and wood
Coffin no longer a prison

Clawed through dirt through root
Split fingernails on rock and wood
Gasping for last breathable air

Now see a chance at life
The first peek at possible life
Pinpoint flicker of the clear day above

Hand breaks through to empty air
The other soon joins to widen the hole
An arm, then two free to the sound of birds

Head surges through, a ragged gasp
Scream victory rolling through the headstones
Shocked mourners a few graves over

Haggard and filthy this corpse that was
Pulls free of the shoveled earth
Heaving and winded, to lay upon the grass
Instead of below it