If I feel any heat at all
it’s only the sting of bath water
not nearly hot enough to melt
the flesh off my bones-
but if it could; I’d stand
a skeleton before the harvest moon-
Whistling a melancholy tune,
to worship the autumn, as it comes
so slowly across the canvas of this rural life-
and seeps through the branches of
elderly trees, like a poison in the ribs,
rushing fast through the pulse, and faster still
to reach the center of the heart,
where it will cause catastrophic destruction
until it arrests or succumbs to the absolution:
the dying is what hurts and death, the surrender.
If I feel life at all,
It’s only the ache of a heart beating,
a slow Tic-Tock like a bomb leaking death
inside my head-
If I fill my lungs with breath
it’s not the exhalations of God,
or the perfume of angels- but;
the exhaustion of mourning and
the loneliness of being.
If I feel anything at all, other than
tranquil sorrow-
I must die to the dead,
for they’ve asked me
to let them rest.
Amberlee Carter
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/revelations-in-a-sunday-morning-shower/
