I sit on the steps of God’s house, contemplating the depression eating away at me like the stage 4 cancer failing both of my kidneys. Family’s hugs and weary eyes remind me of my enclosing demise. Can they see me?

I hide melting into the blackness. Alone, understanding and accepting what the future holds. Their stress hurts to watch; though, a confession lightens the soul it burdens the listener. They could not bear to know that their loving gaze makes me feel sicker. I’m beginning  to hunger for an escape into the clouds. My sweet chariot to swing low and ascend. Feel the warm kiss of death while she entangles my body and we drift into that ever lasting sleep.

I breathe deep and hold it in as if I’m drowning. Trying to feel the breathlessness of my lungs collapsing when I am no longer moving. I suppose on a grand scale death’s always pending . So it’s not fear that fuels this sense of certainty but knowing that they will miss me. Sitting here. Visualizing my daughter’s pain as her teardrops stain the hollowed shell of my remains. What comfort could my spirit gain knowing that I’m the reason she cries rain every night?

He pushed his hand into night’s pocket, seizing his food of desperation and munched it, the nutrients nestling in the thicket of his bowels; imagining death as his distant lover. He shunned all those who searched for him and moved further into the corner, cold floor, and hard wall his brothers whispering in his ear. Will you go now, right now, gently into her beckoning arms?

His answer may have been yes had it not been for the bucketful of gold rising in the sky, spilling yellow rays onto his cheeks that danced into his eyes. He could see his selfish ways. The courage to live kicked up in his throat as if singing from a serpent’s tongue. It whipped and split the remaining dark. Movitated him to seek out his seekers. Hang onto their hugs. Dry those weary eyes since a minute of their happiness was worth more than a moment of his despair.

With the sun warm on my face I sink deeper into their embrace. I don’t tell them about my relationship with death. She will come knocking on my door, waiting for me to satisfy her; but today, I will not answer.