DEATH Poem: wounds that stung now sing, by Rhy Anderson

If we ever leave this world alive, I will beg at the wheels of God’s wheelchair
let the ones I left sleep soundly, that is, let no manmade sound be outside their room
when they sleep
I beg the night-time to be as calm as a winter blanket
let it stretch over everyone
like adding water to soup it does not matter how thinly,

this beggar’s bowl of a wish will hold you like skies can’t
like governments won’t.

when I bury the rust of peacetime deep into all the chambers of my quiet heart
let it jam every orchestra of war in my survival instinct
let it clog up every artery of action left bleeding and open,
stuffed under my skin like a magician’s scarf.

I beg you
let every finger that holds a trigger drop like overripe fruit
it was never the fault of the bullet
the bullet like me searches for any way forward,
it does not know how to return to the past
how to stop moving
it only races ahead
until collapsing.

Sit beside me.

A birdsong Thursday on court room steps
our hands grasping indifferent air
let us eat the marrow of justice
lewd, blood rich and greasy jawed, we have learned
to not stop chewing
this is the only way to swallow
what we call justice
a mangled and miserable thing
a thing our mouths were born
to tear strips out of
now rest with me.

In silence.

In the field
birds eat the ants beside our bare toes and our butts
so thick
praise to this thick ass and how it jiggles with the fat of living

I don’t want to die thin
and I don’t want to die with my boots on
choking on a shower of debris, dust blind and thirsty

I don’t want us to die
in the white noise silence of machinery
bed-bound, spread out on threadbare sheets that smell of bleach, looking beyond
doorways to no escape just hallways with unblinking eyes of florescence that strip-mine
the colour from the roaring magic of living and the thirsty beeping
as they monitor our decay
in a room
more body parts than bodies

I don’t want to die in bed
so I haven’t

instead I have watched the trademark waste away of a hospital stay
how juicebox legs and jukebox brains slowly lose their stuffing
I was a brand new toy once, what they filled me with shrunk with age

there’s never time to savour the time
only time to be grateful you still remember what’s missing
and call every MIA cell and memory you lose
an act of love
another scarf you can pull out later
to impress a child
like how a scar is a parable of survival

let me kiss you with all I know, as the entropy cancers us thin
it is a full joy folly of living
that every moment lost is one to treasure
the childhood toy that is loved is unrecognisable from when it began
and that is the happiest end I can beg for

because nothing on this green and blue 3rd planet will ever smell as good
as a toy damaged from the constant war of acts of love
this is what it means to me to have a life worth living.
the smell of overuse, of every greasy finger print that touched me, held me, pushed me
hurt me and saved me
will comfort better than a blanket stretched to keep me safe can.
I no longer beg for blankets for those I leave behind, I hope we go beyond together, and
where it is
doesn’t hurt every torn ear and burst button of us
I promise you
if there is more beyond this and we still suffer
that world will wish I never died

better to die not at all
but what a misery to live forever.
I have decided I do not mourn my own decay
I have found the joy in crumbling so
if someone is left to write for me
let them write on my tombstone that I died
from too many acts of love

and when you try to sleep
if you hear me call your name know that
this is not my voice, this is not a lullaby, this is not the wind –
the pressures keep changing, the earth is spinning and squeezing and draining just like
us.
it’s calling to you
it says
“, and before you go, please give me a kiss and tell me that
all that hurt
helped you feel alive”