To My Friends
My good friends, when you’re under the illusion
That the common end of things has ended me,
Whether that end was sudden or wretchedly slow,
Peaceful or violent, untimely or, finally, wished for,
Don’t spend too much time grieving, as if I were gone
To some murky underground region of swampy water
And cavernous absence, metallic and silent and cold,
Or some plush resort in the stratosphere of our dreams
Pillowed with cumuli, graced by ethereal muzak,
Or some massive confusing impersonal processing center
With lines and obscure snafus and numbers not names,
Away from the sun and the sound of the wind in the trees,
But after a short ceremony, public or private,
Listen for the wings of the birds, and ask where we’re going,
Alabama or Delaware, Canada, Yucatan,
And wish me luck in the next life, who now have wings.
from Joseph Harrison, Identity Theft, Waywiser Press, 2008.
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Author: The Best American Poetry
