I have never feared…

I have never feared death.

A failure of the imagination
that I cannot comprehend
my own ending.

I have only desired
to eat from a plate heaped high
with life's joys and sorrows.

To know what it is to love
so much that my heart
shudders in my chest;
to be so grief-stricken
that same heart slows
and stops between each beat

I thought that would be enough.
Just to know.

Now I lie beside my daughter
my hand on her back
soothing the child to sleep.

I can feel the bones shifting
under her skin,
the skin stretching
under my hand,
as she shifts and grows
and leaps towards her future.

Impossible.
Obscene.

That someday this star-child,
quick-limbed, full of wicked
delight, this gods-gift
beyond all expectation or hope,
should be taken away.
Bright voice silenced,
returned to dust.

Now I know what it is
to fear death.

Now my heart shudders
and slows
and stops.

*****