437 Death poems

The doctor said to my father, “You asked me to tell you when nothing more could be done. That’s what I’m telling you now.” My father sat quite still, as he always did, especially not moving his eyes. I had thought he would rave if he understood he would die, wave his arms and cry out. He sat up, thin, and clean, in his clean gown, like a holy man. The doctor said, “There are things we can do which might give you time, but we cannot cure you.” My father said, “Thank you.” And he sat, motionless, alone, with the dignity of a foreign leader. I sat beside him. This was my father. He had known he was mortal. I had feared they would have to tie him down. I had not remembered he had always held still and kept quiet to bear things, the liquor a way to keep still. I had not known him. My father had dignity. At the end of his life his life began to wake in me.

He looked down at his withering body and saw a hair near his navel, swaying. And now he saw his other hairs rise up. He felt a hectic current in his veins. Looking within, he saw the bubbling of his blood. He cursed his fever, saying: “It is the chemistry of prayer. It increases in frequency, seeding panic to all my being. My cells swell with the liquid of guilt they fabricate, juices of hatred eat my belly my corpuscles make war in me as they devour each other. My head heats in the combustion of anxiety, I am polluted by the secretions of my soul’s decay, while my brain wears away with the scratching night and day on the encephalograph of prayer. I grow monstrous with the leukemia of the world.” And he heard the hair say: “Hear me.” And he saw it grow gray as it waved. All his hairs he saw whiten, and, numberless, wilt from their erect electric listening. He saw them topple from their roots. “How dare you!” he cursed them. There surged a brief resuscitation to his body. His heart took heart and pounded twice with the health of fear But then the plague of prayer redoubled and overwhelmed him. In his feebleness he raged, and said: “I will tear out this evil and free it.” With his withered hands he tore the remaining hairs from his body and head. With his nails he opened his breast, and with his fist he exploded his heart, which erupted, a black and red volcano. As his brain tasted, for the first time, the birth of his doom, he came a rolling tide, a floating mountain of ecstasy. “I see you! I love you!” his eyes cried, overflowing with his bright blood. “You were the light of the world that are now my gushing tears— the kind and fiery tears of chaos, that wash my eyes with the cure of oblivion.” “He hears us!” cried his sick blood pouring from his ears. “Even as of old he heard our hair before it perished.” With his last strength, the chemistry of prayer, a few drops of his blood coagulated. That clot whirled out, free, in the vortex of the universe.

Eat thou and drink; to-morrow thou shalt die. Surely the earth, that's wise being very old, Needs not our help. Then loose me, love, and hold Thy sultry hair up from my face; that I May pour for thee this golden wine, brim-high, Till round the glass thy fingers glow like gold. We'll drown all hours: thy song, while hours are toll'd, Shall leap, as fountains veil the changing sky. Now kiss, and think that there are really those, My own high-bosom'd beauty, who increase Vain gold, vain lore, and yet might choose our way! Through many years they toil; then on a day They die not,—for their life was death,—but cease; And round their narrow lips the mould falls close.

Watch thou and fear; to-morrow thou shalt die. Or art thou sure thou shalt have time for death? Is not the day which God's word promiseth To come man knows not when? In yonder sky, Now while we speak, the sun speeds forth: can I Or thou assure him of his goal? God's breath Even at this moment haply quickeneth The air to a flame; till spirits, always nigh Though screen'd and hid, shall walk the daylight here. And dost thou prate of all that man shall do? Canst thou, who hast but plagues, presume to be Glad in his gladness that comes after thee? Will his strength slay thy worm in Hell? Go to: Cover thy countenance, and watch, and fear.

Whoever comes to shroud me, do not harm Nor question much That subtle wreath of hair, which crowns my arm; The mystery, the sign, you must not touch, For 'tis my outward soul, Viceroy to that, which then to heaven being gone, Will leave this to control And keep these limbs, her provinces, from dissolution. For if the sinewy thread my brain lets fall Through every part Can tie those parts, and make me one of all, Those hairs which upward grew, and strength and art Have from a better brain, Can better do'it; except she meant that I By this should know my pain, As prisoners then are manacled, when they'are condemn'd to die. Whate'er she meant by'it, bury it with me, For since I am Love's martyr, it might breed idolatry, If into other hands these relics came; As 'twas humility To afford to it all that a soul can do, So, 'tis some bravery, That since you would have none of me, I bury some of you.

in our village are short and to the point. While the mourners are finding their seats Etta Andrews plays “Now the Day Is Over.” No one is ashamed to wipe his or her eyes. Then the Reverend stands up and reads the Lord’s Prayer with the mourners speaking it with him. Then there is a hymn, usually “Rock of Ages” or one chosen by the wife of the deceased. The deceased, I might say, is never present, except for an urn prepared by Mr. Torrant, who is always squinting. Next there are remarks by the Reverend. He is a kind man and can be relied upon to say something nice about the life of the departed, no matter how much he may have been scorned or even disliked. The Reverend’s eulogies are so much the same, with appropriate readings from scripture, that I gave up listening to them years ago. Instead, unheard, I eulogize myself, the real picture of how I’ve been in the village. I admit that I was self-satisfied and arrogant. I didn’t go to much pains to provide diversions for my wife. When the children and grandchildren came for visits I lectured them and pointed out their faults. I made appropriate contributions to the local charities but without much enthusiasm. I snubbed people who bored me and avoided parties. I was considerate to the people who worked in the post office. I complained a great deal about my ailments. When I’m asked how I’m doing, I reply that I’m not getting any younger. This inveterate response has become a bore in the village. After the Reverend’s eulogy is over there is another hymn, and the benediction. As they leave everyone, except me, presses the flesh of the bereaved with appropriate utterances. But I get away as quickly as I can. If they don’t bore me I like almost all the people in the village. But as they go, I tick them off. I’ve been to at least fifty funerals. When will mine be?

a line of faces borders the strangler’s work heavy european women mist blows over dusty tropical plants lit from beneath the leaves by a spotlight mist in my mind a riffled deck of cards or eccentrics was i a waterton animal my head is not my own poetry is neither swan nor owl but worker, miner digging each generation deeper through the shit of its eaters to the root – then up to the giant tomato someone else’s song is always behind us as we wake from a dream trying to remember step onto a thumbtack two worlds – we write the skin the surface tension that holds you in what we write is ever the past curtain pulled back a portrait behind it is a room suddenly lit looking out through the eyes at a t.v. programme of a monk sealed into a coffin we close their eyes and ours and still here the tune moves on

I had no idea that the gate I would step through to finally enter this world would be the space my brother's body made. He was a little taller than me: a young man but grown, himself by then, done at twenty-eight, having folded every sheet, rinsed every glass he would ever rinse under the cold and running water. This is what you have been waiting for, he used to say to me. And I'd say, What? And he'd say, This—holding up my cheese and mustard sandwich. And I'd say, What? And he'd say, This, sort of looking around.

Followed by his lodge, shabby men stumbling over the cobblestones, and his children, faces red and ugly with tears, eyes and eyelids red, in the black coffin in the black hearse the old man. No longer secretly grieving that his children are not strong enough to go the way he wanted to go and was not strong enough.

At first you didn’t know me. I was a shape moving rapidly, nervous at the edge of your vision. A flat, high voice, dark slash of hair across my cheekbone. I made myself present, though never distinct. Things I said that he repeated, a tone you could hear, but never trace, in his voice. Silence—followed by talk of other things. When you would sit at your desk, I would creep near you like a question. A thought would scurry across the front of your mind. I’d be there, ducking out of sight. You must have felt me watching you, my small eyes fixed on your face, the smile you wondered at, on the lips only. The voice on the phone, quick and full of business. All that you saw and heard and could not find the center of, those days growing into years, growing inside of you, out of reach, now with you forever, in your house, in your garden, in corridors of dream where I finally tell you my name.