Full Life Spilt

The idea of giving a creature a full life,
What is that? What’s the appropriate
Moral term for it? Is it patronizing?
Is it the core of all other kindly notions?

You find it often among other thoughts—
Watching some organism seem to savor
A moment you seemed to have enabled.
Let the cat out the door to explore. Rescue

The cricket that the cat caught in its jaws.
From small acts that you’re pleased
To consider mercies that you’ve yourself
Given, to lifelong commitments, even

The most enormous of those—parenting—
Have you done the most possible to give
This creature whose soul you've attended,
Whose life you've fed and shepherded

A full life, a good life, a rewarding life?
Hard to think so when you know you are
Dying. Not so bad for you, selfish you.
Nothing isn’t bad. Nothing’s no good.

If only you could get to nothing, without
Breaking your child’s full, rewarding life
On the way. And you ask yourself, in sort
Of a desperate way—this idea of giving

A creature a full life—What is that? What is
The appropriate moral terminology for it,
Especially if you fail to accomplish it?
Of all kindly emotions, was that the core?