With quickened shock,
I hear my mother say,
on the telephone, tonight,
she will not be around
for the five years I ask her for…

“Please,” I think, “please be.”

Carnal flesh, it sucks Life
from consuming Death, it sucks
to be ensnared in addiction.

I know. I’m a third generation
smoker. ‘Light me up’; Pink Elephants
used to define a time of innocence.
It was a board game, still is, as far
as I know, but, my box is gone.
The cards and the board, scattered..

And, as always, I digress, into self.
Ourselves. My mother is dying, but,
so am I. Gods or powers or Fate,
why can’t epiphanies wait
until I’ve crossed Sea’s wake?

Do you think, world, that Poets
are faint? No, I know now, I know
emotions, feelings, spirit and soul
are one, there is no end, in our sight.
So, to preserve soul, spread
your love to the heights
of equality! “To live,
we must give.”

Erin Elizabeth Kelly-Moen
© Copyright 8/18/04