words

as you stand on that precipice
can you see where it all ends?
is there some beacon calling you
out there in all that dark?
can you tell me what you see?

if i could go with you,
would you be less afraid?
if i could be your son
even in the after,
would you show me that way also?

or is this all a prelude,
a preamble of great sadness yet to come,
of motions yet to falter,
ends yet to meet,
will you outlive me
and ask the same questions?

how you have brought this here,
this fate that all must barter with,
is a strangeness unto itself,
and i am unequipped to bear it
and the constant stirring
of a child’s thoughts and wonders,
the imponderable end of the world
where no suns blot the day
and no moons cross the night
drawing questions of origin and terminus,
watching myself in the long ago,
my child’s hands, my startled eyes,
my small voice and my little rapid heart,
all things past tense
yet here in this moment,
never exceeding, naught of tangible evidence.

can you smell its harrowing presence,
does it permeate throughout this house
when none but you are home to breathe it?
would you speak of such things at all
had you the words within you to speak?
would you keep it locked away,
in a bottle, in a chamber,
would you show me such terrible certainty?

i have grown accustomed to the fear
of your departure
and it leaves me breathless,
a personified nightmare that strangles
my heart with its mere vicinity,
its dark form from what dark continent
where all this life’s sorrow originates,
i would ask you not to go,
but would you stay? would you choose
to be here still when only the inescapable awaits?
would you teach me, only a moment more,
how to live, how to be the bearer
of this blood we share?
would you counsel me on poisoning
the terrible things within?

fly, do not pause when that moment comes,
go on in to the dark
and fill it with your igneous soul.

-S.C. Martinez