What About Death?
or just a loaded metaphor
in the name of power
and inadequate extension.
In our own name and the
names of our children
many have always colored
death. Those who never
ran from a cluster bomb or
lived scrub to the ground.
The cage door's always open
they say, answering each question
with another question.
In the name of rebels and martyrs
thrown into the unknown,
our fate (our death) becomes
like the golden breath of day.
But with God as our strength
does our so-called inspiration
qualify for Death? Or do we peer
onward in a valley of make-believe
avoiding the same questions
our parents never asked?
Perhaps we must unlearn death, or
reach another point that must be
reached to understand. Men,
armies, centuries die and are
put away forever, yet nothing
happens again and again.
No pictures of the funeral, nor
the object of grieving.
Does it matter? Is it of interest?
We've nearly reached that point,
inspired by our own tapestries
and rapt by tales, by rhymes
and toasting our lives a thousand
times, as though the dead are
to be desired. With walls and
barbed wire upon us, we say
what's right and never blink.
But what if we imagine our own
children in rage, in withered
bloody veins and sudden laughter
springing from their lips?
Can we ever boast of such a
cage? To go where?
In that Dark - to that God?
A radiance? Or a Lord in the
void? Maybe men created Death
so that being dead, we rise.
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