strange days

from a review

my mother used to read the obituaries

every morning

and one day she found her own name

but she is a morbid woman

and if i die

i don't want to read it in a paper

 

i thought of asking someone

to write me an epitaph the other day

so that i might have one small detail

pinned down

and then have less to worry over

when i'm gone

 

i'm just afraid that in asking

someone to define succinctly who i am

i might not like the answer

Reviews

[SLW]

I think characters are always so infinitely nuanced and complicated, can we ever tryly have an a few words, definitive aspect of someone? Saying that, I think I'd have that fear too. My Grandad always says to me he reads the obituaries at 85 to double-check he's still alive :-)

[Distant horizons]

Excellent. I think i'll just have on my gravestone...See! I told you I was ill
:-)

[Bare trees]

I guess we make of ourselves whoever we think we are, until someone tells us different in some way we might not have expected. Perhaps we are afraid of our faults coming to the surface to haunt us. This is a thought-provoking poem for sure.

[Suze]

Very thoughtful and insightful. I like this poem, it's so true that when we ask others to define us we are opening ourselves to hearing something we may not want to. The way we see ourselves is so different than how the world usually views us.

[Dane Osborne]

The phoenix serves to prove that beauty comes from ashes.

[Stacey Watts]

I think there are people that know us but I feel in order to truly know is to look inside oneself. This made me to wonder about that same thing. Very well expressed here.

[...]

. oh, emily ... you are so humble and so beautiful and so graceful ... only a poet could define you ... and i think i might have a guess about who it would be ... this is an amazing poem ... it makes me wonder about what would happen after i am gone ... maybe i shouldn't worry about it though ... there are so many people in india ... that if i am gone ... i don't think anyone would notice ... ha ha! ... i must be sounding morbid ... (like my mother) ... do forgive me ... i guess this poem is such a trippy one ... that i'm buzzing with all the thoughts it's triggering ... you sure know how to get your readers thinkin' ...