Ingredients

[David Kavanagh’s recent poem, ‘Of Infinity’ so astonished me in its similarity to my own pet theory, that I was inspired to finish this poem that I had been struggling to get right.] *** All the ingredients there ever were The atoms of everything ready to stir All of the molecules in you and me Have been in existence since prehistory It’s sheer mathematics it simply must be Our atoms exist in perpetuity All that there was is all that there is And all that there is is all there will be One big Earthly spice rack, our ‘from’ and our ‘to’ Yesterday’s old becomes tomorrow’s new A smidgen of this and a teaspoon of that A pinch and a sprinkle made me… and my cat And when I lay down for my very last time New life will come using bits that were mine Because when we die we return to the rack To season the new with whatever they lack Though space ships go up and there’s asteroid hits Our Earth doesn’t gain or lose that many bits So cave men and mammoths and tyrannosaurs Had bits that are mine and bits that are yours The atoms that make up the grasses and trees The monkeys, the bats, the horses and bees Might one day be water or silver or tin Or even your great, great, great granddaughter’s gin So whether we’re burnt or laid into the ground We’ll be going spare when the time comes around It may be our iron or maybe our salt For all that we are does not become nought We’re made from ingredients from way back when And someday we’ll all be ingredients again And someone that you may have lost in your past Perhaps you’ll rejoin in the same blade of grass