I
I am surrounded by death and dying.
Each week, there is another funeral for someone I know.
I cannot stay at home; I must go.
And when I see the mourners there, I will say,
“They are in a better place.”
(Now that they are in a vase.)
“They are blessed, for they no longer need to feel any pain.”
(We no longer must listen to them complain.)
I am not usually so full of malice.
Being snide like that
(hiding between parentheses)
is somewhat unfeeling and surely callous.
It is as if I am protecting myself from the pain of grief
in a shell of sarcasm and irreverence.
II
My mother suffered from severe emphysema.
She told me that it was like drowning each day, every day.
My mother was very neat and tidy.
She scheduled her death in the same way she scheduled her life,
with an ordered plan laid out beforehand.
Was she selfish for leaving us?
Or was I selfish for asking her to stay?
III
It seems as if everyone we love leaves us,
sometimes in life and sometimes in death.
Sometimes they beg for release,
sometimes they suddenly depart with no warning.
Sometimes it is clean and sometimes it is very messy.
We are left to pick up the pieces as we weep in mourning.
Which is better for them? Which is better for us?
IV
We are such narcissistic, self-absorbed vessels of fear.
Are we here for some higher purpose?
Will someone make it clear?
I fear that death is the only true form of understanding,
where we learn that nothing and no one really matters.
Perhaps it will be heaven or the hated latter.
I hope that there is a flower at the end of the runway,
or a light at the end of the tunnel.
V
How will I be remembered?
Will I be honored for my actions?
Will I be praised for the things I created or accomplished,
or for taking vacations and finding distractions?
Perhaps, the memories will be of the briefest moments,
of the least significant events,
like the things I remember about those I have loved.
VI
Soup and sandwiches, long lunch talks,
the smell of aftershave and stale smoke,
birthday poems, foot rubs,
encounters and colored pencils,
card games, fried chicken at a picnic, blue suspenders,
coconut meringue pie, a mouse’s squeak,
glasses of white wine, a hundred cats,
summer camping and a collection of hats,
eating and drinking with friends.
These are the memories that truly define lives well-lived.
VII
I fear that I will be remembered for
gin and tonics, sitting in my chair,
playing games, growling loudly,
leaving parties early, the things I liked to wear,
my fear of speaking, laughing proudly,
being a snarky twit.
VIII
We are all dying,
from the moment our soul is infused within our body.
As we begin living, we are dying.
It’s the ultimate dichotomy,
either we are trying to live and are afraid of death,
or we are afraid of living and are trying to die.
VIII
I think that feeling sorry for yourself
is the greatest form of self-indulgence.
When your heart is filled with pity for yourself,
you have no room to care for others.
IX
The meaning of death is often misunderstood.
It is not in our grief and in our sorrow.
It is in the communal experience,
the sharing of our pain with others.
In this process, we learn to feel empathy for one another
instead of just sympathy for ourselves.
X
Let me be remembered,
not because of what I did or didn’t do,
not for what I said or didn’t say,
not for how much money I earned, or how much I threw away,
but in the faces of my children and my grandchildren.
Please let my legacy be their smiles and laughter.
This is the thing that is most sought after.
Mark James Trisko has been writing poetry for his entire life, but after retiring recently, he heard his muses yelling loudly in the night begging him to work harder. He currently lives in Minnesota, with his beautiful wife, four wonderful children and eight above-normal grandchildren.
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