Death is everywhere.
“I have almost everything” says Death
But He idles in a rattle-box like the rest of us
His voice sounds like a drunk piano with loose hinges
Scratchy, ubiquitous and insistent, not very musical

It’s five million years or longer for him,
The five days the dogwood blooms
“I have your breath” says the dogwood
Dogwood petals fall one white blur at a time
The snowy field is not the work of an evening’s flurry

It is one expiry at a time, collecting the piano rattle dead
He must wait, his lust and greed unsatisfied while
Pacing in the cell of days as stars whiz around his head
“Five more minutes” we say meekly, obsequious, quietly breaking
Ageless fences and climbing over to the Dogwood side, one at a time.