The Last Act of Love
I’ve written of your death as metaphor, us
as two candles, one now snuffed out,
of our family’s vigil at your final breath,
as technology ticked on screens to
a flatline,
of the shock, our immovability,
frozen as the wild flakes’ chaos in a
winter’s night sure to make our loneliest
of rides up a dangerous canyon
a perilous coda to a nightmare,
completely real, just beginning,
but I’ve avoided the thing I knew
only I should do, that no one else
be required, expected, subjected,
invited to attempt, only
I, in that terrible sterile silent place
was not exempt,
it could only be me
to lift that sheet and slowly pull
it up, up, up,
past your shoulders,
your neck, and then completely cover
your face.
We stood and stared, disbelieving, you looked
so at peace, so asleep while the storm became
audible, warning us of danger, of risk,
if we lingered in our new found grief.
We couldn’t speak, could barely breathe,
I knew no relief would come no matter
how long we kept watch, nothing would change,
your life, I had to admit, was over.
But there was still that cover,
the veil, the last task only I must do,
to make what was us, a two, at last
a one.
But none of us moved.
Our sobs were whimpers,
moans, surrender,
and ultimately defeat.
And then I acted. One last kiss, you,
hardly old, already, I could feel,
slowly becoming cold,
as I reached for the corner of the sheet,
as none of our eyes would meet, as I
held that cloth and stood
as still as the silent
machines surrounding you,
and screamed inside my head,
pull! pull it! all the way!
You’ve lifted it now pull!
No one else but you!
And I did, the last act of
love in your presence,
slowly, every inch a goodbye,
before our son and his wife,
the only sounds now their cries,
until. Until my lungs began
working again, and my voice,
an alien sound, so suddenly alone
could barely make the words, somehow
marking a trail into an unknown future:
“Let’s go home.”
The Screaming Klaxon on My Phone Telling Me
Fire ate the sky today
ripping the last black of night
with screaming tongues of
fire, obliterating
the early blue
with smoldering smoke as
fire burned to ash
dreams built with
sweat and joy
and love as
fire laughed to
the sounds of tears
and mocked beauty
and took that too.
Fire froze us in
our tracks, fire
took back promises
of warmth
with daggers of destruction,
chaos in waves of orange
fighting to burn into the
void & to burn into
our eyes.
Now there’s a
mountain of cinders
and detritus filled
with memory, now
there’s a longing
for yesterday, when
we hadn’t yet slept,
hadn’t been screamed awake
to a wall of
fire, reminding us
everything burns
and now there’s a thousand
arms surrounding us,
the sky so calm
reminding us we will rise
from these ashes.
We will rise.
The Wood Wept
The wood wept that day
sap released through ancient knots like tears
to slowly drip down the building
crying for the destruction of its ancient enemy
Fire
Waiting for that hell sent nemesis
to reach the age-old siding
protecting the menagerie of
wooden animals inside
unable to do more than
release the cries of nature
unable to do more than
bare silent witness
its tears now a permanent memory
of the day
it felt the heat ever closer
almost licking that luxurious
siding almost whispering
soon you will be mine
soon I will consume you like a child
relishes cotton candy
and you will fall to ash
and be taken finally from memory.
Those streaks now
a monument
frozen tears forever
stuck in time
to remind us
of that day
the building cried out
Help us help them
if only we still had branches
to wrap around you
to protect you
and hold you
Until the angry fire
took enough
and died
and left us
to sift through the ashes.
So remember
our tears stained
on this building
remember that day we
cried helplessly
remember the day
we survived
to still protect
though we are centuries
from our woods
Remember
After/Thought Literary 