Deaths we do not fathom

Two poems that center around death in some way or another. I bet that makes you really excited to read them now. Anyway, I hope you enjoy them nonetheless :)

Death by the Blade

Even in dreams you can be stabbed; I’ve known it:

the cold dagger sliding into your breast from

a person at the door; the anger different than

the blade, less solid than a statue, yet larger

than the house, or the tree that shrouds it.

But the anger also is the blade, hidden inside

a dusty cloak, as suddenly revealed as it is buried

inside your tired heart. There is a shock deep

within the cycles of sleep, a wound that kills you

once, before the dream repeats.

The scenarios vary, but you cannot stay

dead for long; there is a motive to fulfill,

a belief to share, a reason for their hatred and

your many deaths. Your mind begins to learn who

to trust, where to speak, and when to flee.

Too bad we don’t remember these warnings.

The dream doesn’t leave behind photographs,

only watercolors stirring in the memory that

recall the sting, the inability to escape, and

the betrayal felt. But more often I fear the details I

can’t remember: the wielders of the blades.

A man or a woman, young or old, stranger or

friend. I watch them all now; I sense the daggers close

to their skin, a guard against threat. I recognize also

the weapon beside my own heart and resolve to

throw it away, or surely life will be lost. 

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Earthquakes

Perhaps there was an unjostling of the heart

that I didn’t notice.

Then, I was waiting to be served,

my mind in a book, the book in my hand,

the hand relaxed on the edge of an old table;

the table may or may not have moved.

The waiter asked if I had felt it,

the echoes of the Virginia earthquake,

200 miles away, past plains, rivers and mountains,

or so I imagined. He told me

of the boxes shaking in the back room,

though nothing spilled: no broken

bottles to clean up or

fires to put out;

though closer to the seismic center, there were

cracked buildings with

split pipes, water and gas spraying

into the street,

and real people.

But we didn’t mention it, couldn’t fathom it;

we forgot it,

and laughed about our lost

chance to experience

an earthquake.

Nearby, another customer was still reading,

unaware and absorbed in a letter

from a place I don’t know,

a place I can’t even imagine,

a place that doesn't exist.

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Both of these poems are, in fact, based off of personal experience. The first was really a dream where I was going around talking to people (as if I were still on my mission) and people would stab me and it hurt. And then it started over again with a slightly different set up and each time the me in the dream got smarter and more ready to combat or escape from my assailants. It was a pretty weird dream; I'm not going to lie. So anyway, the next day I kept on thinking about the dream as I was walking around and decided it would make a pretty good poem, and I think it did (I like it, at least).

The second poem was based on the earthquake that just happened in Virginia. I was actually sitting in the Apple Store, not a restaurant, (the former would be a little hard to explain in a poem) but I was reading a book and I didn't notice the earthquake; nor did the Apple Store guy who attended me. He mentioned how it was the second time he'd missed an earthquake (the first time he had been sleeping) and he joked about it a little. Only later, as I thought about it, I realized how lightly we take events like this sometimes, as if, because a disaster happened far away to a place we don't really know, it's almost like it doesn't exist and the pain isn't real. Therefore, that's the kind of idea that I was trying to work into the poem. 

Hopefully something got across from either or both of these poems. Thanks for reading!