Imagine if every day you woke up.
The son of a rich man
But sickness was your portion.
The doctors don’t know what is wrong.
Your body betrays you on a daily basis.
Imagine that
An athlete who struggles to get out of bed.
But you do it every day.
A war hero
Who struggles it off
Saying
It was involuntarily they sank my boat.
Just like you said in your youth.
If I lose any more blood count I’m gonna die.
Your younger brother even said to you
Half-jokingly
If a mosquito bit you that mosquito would die
And you nodded in agreement
You did not die, yet.
But that thought haunts you every day.

You did not become the youngest elected president.
Because you wanted to
You did it because you had to.
Because with the sickness, came gifts.
The gift of reading.
The gift of empathy.
And the gift of charisma
You could make a nurse giggle when you spoke
That so many who would walk around did not have.
You were sure time was short.
Your daddy said
Sons, I could not be president.
One of you must.
You were the one
And thought, maybe I would live longer than I thought
But in the back of your mind you knew
The diseases in you could not be cured
Even by presidential doctor’s hands.
So on the day you were stricken
You knew you might die, any day now.
You just never thought it would be by bullets
And you never could have imagined.
It would give you a kingdom that would live forever.
Called Camelot.
Rest in Peace, JFK.