In the Absence of Any News

Soon, the obits will disappear,

And we won’t even know if we’re

Alive or dead. Would that were true.

Ghosts aside, the dead among you

Have never known, and perhaps, as

The living rarely have Capgras

Syndrome, you’re unlikely to doubt

You’re alive. But think—if throughout

Your life you never once assumed

That you weren’t already entombed

But went on in uncertainty

As to your own mortality—

If you got it into your head

That you might already be dead,

Wouldn’t you be a bit relieved

Death came down, like God, to belief?