Human Allotropy

Allotropes of carbon,
A thousand different moulds,
Each one of us a story.
Nine months 'til we're told,
Then we learn and we stumble
Not only as infants
Into a world
So new and different.
We earn our medals
And battle scars,
Our webs of wrinkles
Make us who we are
And hold a lifetime of experiences
In their rivulets,
Things we want to remember
And want to forget.
Until we stop.
Stop giving and gaining.
Until we stop
And our closer forms start raining.
They pick out a coffin,
Flowers, a wake,
A tombstone, an epitaph
They have to make.
Then they burn you or bury you
And, like carbon, we must
Turn from ashes to ashes
And dust to dust.