The First Drop

“Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood

 / Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather

 /The multitudinous seas in incarnadine,

 / Making the green one red."

~~

William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act II Scene II

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Drowning and floating and drowning again

At the bottom of an ocean of gore:

Living and dying and living again,

For Sin crouches at my door!

Word on the street: I'm beyond saving,

I can't see the stars where I am.

So save your tears for the deserving -

This world hides from my shame.

My mark drives me hither and thither,

Foul rag in a gust of wind;

Doors I knock on crumble and wither

‘Neath my touch, and His wrath so blind!

So, am I really my brother's keeper?

I'll rot in Hell! Wait. I can't die, remember?

I'm a tiller of the soil, and a reaper

Of fruits; but no grave, however somber

Can hold my bones, and feed my flesh

To the worms. Not a blade of grass,

Not a single leaf can push

Its head from the earthen mass

That gaped to receive his blood.

The blood that haunts! O, terrible scourge!

It screams my name, in a sweeping flood

That no penance can purge.

Thus over and again I sink and drown,

In an ocean of kindred blood;

The first drop ever, spilled by my hand,

Turned the shaded green, one red!