Life Sized

You compose a line
With the point of view
Of someone who wants

To live. Death looms large
In rumination.
You compose a line

With the point of view
Of someone who’s seen
Some death in the news

Enumerated.
Each shrinks to a speck,
A morpheme, a bit.

You compose a line
With the point of view
Of someone who’s lost

Old friends and loved ones,
Mostly recently.
Death hovers, midway,

Intermediate
Between mighty god
And mere statistic.

Here’s where you feel it,
Not awed, not inured,
But ruined by it.