After I die <br />some will mourn <br />Others will put on the face of mourning <br />They’ll gather together at two o’clock <br />and be home for dinner. <br />They’ll be wondering what’s for dinner. <br />Maybe they planned ahead and defrosted something. <br />Meanwhile, I’ll still be dead, <br />and all of my passions and sexual adventures and <br />school exams and career choices and career dead-ends <br />will have vanished with the whack of a baseball bat. <br />They’ll scatter my ash someplace pretty <br />but most of it will mix with dust and grime <br />and deposit itself on unremarkable fields or <br />sink to the bottom of water. <br />That’s okay because I’ll still be dead. <br /> <br />Springtime will burst with blossoms and bugs <br />and turn to summer <br />Kids will graduate and parents will smile <br />and wait for marriages and grandchildren <br />New singers and movie stars <br />will face the klieg lights and then <br />slide into tell-all books and then out-of-print. <br />The earth will keep rotating and new <br />planets and galaxies will be discovered <br />and described with mathematics. <br /> <br />All of these will occur and recur like premonitions <br />and I will have no comments or satiric asides. <br />I will not smirk or raise an eyebrow. <br />I will not smile knowingly or put down the newspaper to <br />reach over and hold you tight. <br />I will not preserve or remember this intimate moment with you. <br />I will not say your name or recall your sweet smell. <br />That is why I am breathing deeply now in rhythm with your breathing, <br />That is why I am closing my eyes and caressing your skin <br />slowly<br /><br />Michael Philips<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/i-ll-still-be-dead/
