Poem: The Death

The Death

Another day Another dollar
I got my paycheck Friday
Today was Monday
Two days after that Gray Day

I needed my money
The Bank was two miles away
I decided to walk
That’s when I saw

The Police tape
The crowd of strangers
They gawked
I walked

“Do you know what happened?”

I shook my head
Someone was dead
The Area was closed
Yellow Tape enclosed the area

A blue tarp covered him
How he died I did not know
I did not look back
I had a goal

Now I felt bold
Separated as I was from the crowd
I gained some strength
my individuality was assured

It was hot and I was hooded
I sweated from the heat
When my day was done
I learned of Blue Tarp’s end

Killed in a drag race, Dragged to death
He lost limbs and something more
The reckless children did not even stop
Their lives too important to interrupt

That’s when I remembered
He died two days after my own dread
Only two blocks from where
I felt my own mortality so strongly

What was this?
How did it happen?
I was alive and he was dead
I was even more reckless

I learned no lesson
Only the humor of my fear
It came from a deep place
And its depth felt quite queer

To the man who was once a person
Then a spectacle under a sheet
I felt remorse
What a way to die, To die (that way)

But I have to wonder
Was that meant for me?
That death, that way
I felt it so clearly, on the Gray Day

(Belart)