Member Poem

 
It’s not the ragged silence of your breath
or the taste of ash on your forehead,
but the realization that you’ve lost days, perhaps
weeks, of time.
 
It’s not the scent of memory in your eyes
or the timorous touch of dancing bones,
but the realization that the voices calling out
to you are disembodied.
 
It’s not the fecund pulse of night
or the screech of hinges sliding into place,
but the realization that Death straddles you like a man,
his eyes clenched tight against the pain of nearly losing you.

(Author's Note: This poem was published about a decade or so ago under a different title. I forget where. . .)