Tag Archives: death

Echoes

I don’t want to be stuck down here
the metal creaking
my form popping into something smaller
               and smaller
                              and smaller.

Without light sound is the last reflection
               I see myself
               I see myself
breaking,
                              like breaths fighting for relevance.

               I see myself
               less than I was when that sound was made
                              and diminishing quickly.

               I see myself
               and no one else
futile, trapped beneath the world.

I’m Not Coming Home

Matted felt holds tight against the skin
               the candles that light the night
have cried themselves to stubs
               flickering their last efforts
against the tired authors eyes.

The words he writes seep out like sweat
               something pushed through the pores
that in their passing cools the flesh
               and leaves a heavy weight to the air
growing darker.

The paper beneath his heavy arm
               is folded meticulously for the future
it takes the ink like a dead thing
               pecked apart by carrion birds
the message he writes, hidden bones
               beneath pulpy flesh.

Mumbling the shadows of those scribbled prose
               he tears up against the weakness of his voice
recognizing it now as an alien thing
               only to be heard again as an echo
on some other minds gramophone.

When the words run out
               he will seal it with wax
a few months later it will be read
               by which time he will be dead
resurrected only in those words
               written, though, unsaid
played like an old record
               from memories of higher fidelity.

Sympathy for the Living

Let’s not shed tears for the dead.
No amount of water will see them grow
they rest now comfortably in our memories;
living only in the brightest moments
and spoken of only fondly.
They have no due dates
no responsibilities
they need only absorb eternity
and to be absorbed;
embrace their greatest good.

Let’s not shed tears for the dead.
They will be more than we could
see more places than we will see
within and beyond this humble earth
a line without end
confined only by the scope of time
and the nothing that came before it
to briefly play with life and die.

Let’s not shed tears for the dead.
The horrors are only for the living.
That tragic awareness
a font of possibilities
crashing against clumsy hands
like an ocean seen from a prison window;
the air oppressively humid,
a square of light,
projected against a locked door
framing countless specks of mist
that float away – freely.

Let’s not shed tears for the dead;
only the living can experience loss.

A Gathering

The sound the shovel makes against the earth
feels like a baseball caught in a glove,
it feels like green lights or a found quarter.

The dirt looks like moist brownies
fresh and rich with delicious darkness
a curated destination for well off worms

The broken grass looks no worse
a verdant shag of carpet deep and vibrant
a parade of party poppers exploding green.

A good place to bury a friend
though they’ll never know it.

Parliament

Twelve surrounded the table
where once this world was founded
but now was fated to fall
to a council long since sedated

The years dulled their edges
once sharp minds lulled
by dreams of static nostalgia;
nothing new could mute the old fantastic.

When the end stood before them
to be judged for all its ill and its good
they refused to name if for what it was
and searched amongst themselves for explanation

Thus, in deliberation, the world ended
not in the soft sobered silence of rumination
nor the enraged cacophony of rebellion
but with all the grace of a madman caged

knowing only himself with whom to confer

Awkward Silence

Age is a home observed from a fixed perspective;
               as distance grows,
                              the place gets smaller
               more difficult to live in –
                              alien.

I have no choice but to be where I am now,
               find a way to live in that diminishing space.
that sounds like enough.

“enough” – a limit defined.

When the time comes to pursue that definition
               If anything is wrong
                              I’ll remember (my family)

These strangers with years between
               fly by night fair weather friends,
receipts with formal education
               could tell me anything but,
life insurance pays out five times my salary

So, I’ll ask
                              “How much will my life cost me?”
and we’ll laugh and laugh.

Samsara

What ends will begin again
the distant observer reminds me
                                      hidden in shadow
their eyes reaching out with their own light
           metal things – sharp like ice
                                    seeing me fully;
where presence, thought, and action
                               coincide
                                               all the moments in between.

           A brutal transparency
that turns the veins to stonework.

We lock eyes over long,
                       each of us
                                          throttled by the others gaze
only one of us
                                             haunted by it,
until the day ends and a new one begins.

In the morning

                           I will wake
to see myself staring once again
                                          eager,
but patient to take my place
                to see through these eyes
rather than the emotionless space.