Making the Most

of the Notion

That at Any Moment

I May Drop Down Dead

When I was young I loved

pretending I was about to die.

Nothing appealed more

to my sense of adventure.

I would practice falling

down the stairs

when company came over.

If I found myself

fortunate enough

to be out in a storm,

I would trudge

against the wind

shielding my eyes

from the stinging snow

as though my life

were in utmost danger.

When I got sick

with a mild cold,

I became a veritable

damsel in distress,

(despite being a boy).

And did I tell you?

I’d have given

anything for

a broken leg.

Just imagine learning

to walk again,

struggling up from the wheelchair

in a sand blasted beach house

by the sea.

Now, in mid-life,

the thought of suddenly dying

arouses

a wish to work on myself.

Mind you, its not a thought

I think with my brain,

I simply receive it

as from a distance,

as if I were letting myself

agree to go on

being invented.

With no need

to cling to furniture

to hold this moment 

in place,

I manage to inhabit

more than my body

with absolute authority.

After all, so much of us

exists in a state

of frozen amputation;

upside-down

icebergs

afloat in an

all-consuming

 sky.

Who else has ever

wondered whether

there were too many stars

for our own good?

How better to get

to the bottom 

of myself than

by disintegrating

every night

in order to move 

more freely?

Now that time

resides inside me,

I reserve the right

to consider my life

an entire world

in itself.

But if true, 

it may

prove imperative 

to accept everything

that has happened

(or will happen)

as integral to

one’s own particular

nature. 

As for me,

the mark of

a great adventure

has always been

a matter of life 

and certain death.

7/7/21