Upon the ground in a field buried deep
I came to the body of the lady

She took breath no more and her eyes to ash
My first thought to mount up and ride away
My second – bury her proper neath the tree
My last – the one that stuck – take her with me.

If I left her naked body a shame
My soul would howl at me in quiet nights.

To bury her would hide her name forever
No grieving mother ever to know now
How her smiling daughter then fed the worms
Squirming through the soil dark and deep down.

So I laid the body I found lifeless
In my cart and urged my mule on to town.

This body now no beat or breath inside
But I insist that its story be found.