Ridpath's poem is a short, bleak look at a life that keeps moving without getting anywhere. The title, "Stationary 2," sets the tone: the speaker is stuck in place, even while busy with "goals and obligations."
The opening line is startling. "The main course eating dirt" flips the usual order, so that the one who should be eating is already being eaten, or is heading toward the ground. By the last line, the "body being consumed by the earth" makes the idea of death plain. Between these two images sit smaller, human worries. The speaker wonders who they've hurt, and calls their own declarations "so absurd," which suggests regret and a little self-mockery.
"Revolving, never evolving" is the heart of it: going around in circles without change or growth. The mood is weary, dark and quietly ironic. Ambition looks small beside the fact that everything ends in dirt.