Flying fish over bicycle bars
What single thought flew like a spark
Through turgid brain and frozen blood?
What word, now vanished, formed itself
And sliced through evening traffic air,
Like an uh-oh of finality
As you struck that sidewalk
Like a cannon?
And why is it that no memory
Surfaces like a bubble on your lips?
If Death had come, it would not have hurt.
It would have been easy.
The hurt would have been for others –
Strangers, left holding your body,
Waiting for your loved ones.
I’m glad you didn’t go.
Much life’s left to wade through,
To swim through,
To fly through.
Hurt exists in bad-dream-space,
But you erase hurt –
You go through your life
Erasing hurt.
So that, when the end comes, you will go
With no “Uh-oh.”
You will simply fly away
Leaving breath and blood behind,
And no sorrow will attend your passing.
And you will be a memory,
Then a memory of a memory,
Then, wink out of Mind
Over other bicycle bars farther away from Now.
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