The finding of a corpse (Likfunn) by Jakob Sande

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And so they found Niles
far off in the fields.
There he was lying, rotting and scorching,
the sun glaring into his insides.
Green and blue was his stomach
with gravelly guts and slime
and flies and grubs were teeming in throngs.

Blow-flies so green and fat
laid their eggs in his skin
and milky-white maggots burrowed therein.
A rat poked its head out - there's nothing for sale! -
like a bloody rag with a slimy tail.

And his eyes were wet jelly
running down to his belly,
slippery as slimy spew.
And his nose was a wound, red and bloody,
the bone shining gray.
The rat was there yesterday
and had a fine fat stew.

And the lips had no meat,
they grinned with sharp teeth,
shone ardent like spring sun on snowdrifts.
And the miasma lay heavy around the one not yet buried,
and the crows in a circle would caw and hop swift.

And so four men came and pulled up poor Niles
and laid him out on four poles.
They carried him home while the crows cawed and squawked.
Much of his body slid off of those poles,
and much of his body dissolved into mists,
and much of his body the flies took as gifts,
but all of his bones came home in one piece.