I am dead

Or perhaps---
I am not dead enough

Remember me once,
if memory is kind,
your small song bird.

Chorused stories that I once happily sung for you

Filling a house which made it a home

With my echoes of voice
that heightened ceilings, and breached the walls

And you answered back, encouraged me, with silence.

Your form merged into rigid countenance, face hidden behind the folded others.

 

My song--- was it enough to provide me with your love

Tell me please because I cannot hear you

Soil has no speakers, only the quiet ones with distilled tongues

And life shall be its only witness

 

Truly my hidden pain was your sordid gain

Has my late dowry increased your love for me

Dusty dollars of faded ghosts that once carried with them, morality

Sadly, there was never enough time, never enough to hold for ourselves

So the time has come for your voice

I’m so afraid of the darkness, my bed is hard and cold, where are all the comforts I once knew

I ask you please, begin--- there can be no shame when I am your only audience

Do not fail, the reach is too great in some other way

Sing me a song father, sing me back to sleep.