A Death at One Hundred — Summary

In 2014 I was born And one hundred years later I die:

Cut my brain and trace The strata of radio signals Layered deep like the ocean.

Age my flesh by the layers of Grime and smog and peer Through my eyes to study distortions Burned and worn by the rivulets Of twenty four seven news cycles.

Trace on my fingertips the keys I have Caressed from birth.

Scatter my bones like birdseed Across the landfills and the wreckage That they might find the screens that once told me I was loved.

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The speaker imagines their own death at a hundred, having been born in 2014, and asks someone to examine the body as if it were a record of the life lived. The brain holds layers of radio signals, like sediment on the ocean floor. The skin carries grime and smog. The eyes are worn down by the constant flow of news. Even the fingertips bear the marks of keys they have touched since birth. Nothing here is natural; everything is shaped by technology and pollution.

The ending is the most striking part. The bones are scattered across landfills and wreckage, and the hope is that someone will find the screens that "once told me I was loved." The speaker seems to suggest that this was where love came from, and the line feels both tender and hollow. The mood is cool, clinical and quietly sad, like an autopsy report that slowly reveals a lonely life. It reads as a warning about growing up inside devices.

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