Donation — Summary

Dave BontaContemplative

give me to a body farm a body to watch day and night a no-body more other than a dog better than my own vexed home

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The speaker asks to be given, after death, to a body farm, a place where human remains are left out in the open so scientists can study how they decay. It's an odd request, and the poem treats it quietly, almost like a practical favor.

What stands out is the reason. Being watched "day and night" by researchers, and being turned into a "no-body," seems better to the speaker than "my own vexed home." The word "vexed" suggests a home full of trouble or unease, though the poem doesn't say what kind. Even the strange attention of strangers, or a dog's, sounds preferable to that.

The mood is dry, blunt, and a little darkly funny, with an undercurrent of loneliness. The speaker doesn't sound dramatic or afraid. There's a weary calm in the way death becomes a kind of escape, and in the wish to be useful, or at least noticed, somewhere other than where life felt uncomfortable.

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