Requiem
Listen to poem:
I
Incontrovertible truths endure
when the beginning of the end has begun -
blessed is he who rejoices in his fate
and damned is the fool by his own will undone.
But do not despair my life revoked,
drink and joke as I have drank and joked.
II
I feared life more than dying,
more than God and more than mortal sin.
Alas now I wait for the bell to sound
and hearken a lone piper’s pibroch in the wind.
For one last defiant gesture I crave
before I am dressed a corpse in my grave.
III
Remember me a simple man
whose life and fate was long ago sealed -
freed from the wrath and the battle
like some fallen soldier on some forgotten field.
But that long road to my death knell
leads to heaven through the gates of hell.
IV
Now the quietus I welcome
for I cannot lose that which I never found,
and as I in my pit unhonoured lay
all ego and puffery does perish underground.
I think it well I am without remorse
no immovable object or irresistible force.
V
Will Death be my redeemer
when all that survives is animus and fear?
In final revelation and affirmation
might the Kingdom of Heaven be waiting there?
Or will old incarnation flesh and bone
forever die a lost soul ‘neath a headstone?
VI
So drink! Drink and be merry
O’ friend and brother and sister when I pass,
but in my grave bury me face down
and cheeks up and let this world kiss my ar-se!
This I freely do with a contented scoff -
now pucker up…bend over…and kiss off!
Written: October 1992
“We live, we die, and the wheels
on the bus go round and round”
Copyright © Keith D Trestrail | Year Posted 2024
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