O, as effortlessly as life inspired
Doth it leave thy frame,
As all lifeforms once sired
Leave by way they came;
Portentous coalescence
Of loose movements charged,
As riverine flints
So momentously barged—
Ah, meaning must be there inferred
By so mysterious a word,
But, no, you know death,
And the poet’s slant
Prolongs breath
The way that breathing can’t,
As swords are dulled by swing,
Like a bell within a ring,
Seed as concentrated plant;
Hence, what art thou?
Movement defines not life,
Which exercises heaven’s orbs,
Nor existential strife,
As stress the rock absorbs,
Then breaks in tidal energy,
Which transfers stone to stone,
Some residing within thee,
Trapped within thy bone,
Released with its own crack,
Not spiritous energy—
No lifeforce others lack—
All wave and no sea;
So, what words can I offer thee of death
Inarticulable by thine own breath?
Perhaps placation in comradery,
Knowing I will die as thee—
Leaves upon a river course
Looping back unto its source,
Flowing eternally.
Ah, its description always triter
Than what’s described,
Befitting too well subjects of poetry,
And apt of distraction in abstraction,
As too much wind for the sail,
Which, in needing of but a whisper breeze,
Is wrecked ashore in zealous zephyr
Of he who quills tranquil medicament
In verbose inconspicuity,
As elucidation of opaque quandary
Muddles the declaration,
For is death not a question
Yielding so simple an answer
To so problematic a result?
You once were mobile,
Now you are still;
You once were fed,
Now you will feed;
You once were alive,
Now you are dead.
Perhaps the dilemma of describing death
Is that it needs no description,
As written into our bones,
Doth we live knowing life’s finality,
At times so restless and defiant
As to suppose posthumous vivacity;
Yet, the restive, unmoving graves
Evidence only the quieting of personality,
Rustling only in life’s transference.
Friend, comrade, you will die,
As will I… as will I,
So, while you breathe,
Be no less charitable
As thee will be in death,
Granting life to the moribund mortals,
Always precipitous no matter the longevity;
I can advise and expound only thus:
Accept ineluctable progression, For thou would die without death.

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