Like the Day I Was Born | Poem

 

LIKE THE DAY I WAS BORN

Philip Vassallo

I died in my sleep today. It felt like nothing
I knew: No gush of ocean swallowed

until my belly burst, no cold stones
pressed hard against my opened eyes,

no solitary scream hollered
through a thousand empty drain pipes.

All that preparation for nothing.
That's what changed: nothing.

Moments before I died I was dreaming
of the years to come, the lines I would stand in,

the empty theaters I would wait in,
the artists long dead who would distract me

from who I was, the journals I would waste
my loving on. I didn't even break a sweat. And, now, this

dying: no stale coffee, no reek of cigarette smoke,
like nothing I knew. But changeless

like the day I was born.
 

to Philip   /   to Moongate

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