The crack and crash of tree limbs
signaled nothing to me yet -
I did not see him, fearsome head of Death,
stalking to where the boy lay, screaming.

There was a wall of stone,
a pale whip of chain link and
a splash below.
We were young and reckless and
there, in the morbid glory of it,
pushing through the trees.

I snapped out of it once they closed the black bag.
I climbed up the rock and
Daddy, Daddy, carry me down the mountain.
Take me back across the sea.