Conrad Siever, speaking from beyond the grave, rejects the cemetery with its sterile grass and evergreens, where mourners nurse vain hopes of contacting the dead. He wants no part of that wasted garden. Instead, he chooses to be buried under the apple tree he tended for so many years with his gnarled hands. There, his body will not simply molder in a decorative plot; it will break down and feed the roots of the northern-spy, becoming part of the soil, the wood, and finally the fruit itself. The mood is earthy and quietly satisfied rather than mournful. Death is not a vague spiritual reunion for him, but a physical return to a place he loved, continuing his life as redder apples.
Conrad Siever — Summary
Not in that wasted garden Where bodies are drawn into grass That feeds no flocks, and into evergreens That bear no fruit— There where along the shaded walks Vain sighs are heard, And vainer dreams are dreamed Of close communion with departed souls— But here under the apple tree I loved and watched and pruned With gnarled hands In the long, long years; Here under the roots of this northern-spy To move in the chemic change and circle of life, Into the soil and into the flesh of the tree, And into the living epitaphs Of redder apples!