One

Under the pile,

as the stacked bodies

came to be called,

they found

one,

not poisoned

not shot,

but suffocated

under the deadweight

of her mother

and father.

Twenty-five pounds

pressed facedown

into the earth

with the urgent desire

of a farmer

who knows that the village

crop will not survive

under cloudless skies

but plants his seeds

nonetheless.

(This poem is from the collection Jonestown: A Vexation by Carmen Gillespie. An article by Dr. Gillespie appears here.)