sinking

Facing a person expiring you see the wisdom of death concentrated like a black pearl, Sink to the bottom of the sea's inky gaze
And pierce your own bubble
Adrift in the slimy weeds like an unsuspecting octopus

It jerks you awake and pulls you open like taffy

Freeing you from the easy struggle of too many arms 

And the coagulated truths in your over-sized head

No longer clear who is rising and who falling

Or whether it was kindness or envy to point that out

In either case you’re drinking and drowning

And there’s a kind of shame in that as well as the sense that it wasn’t polite to unmoor you

Who wanted to be the anchor 

And not the tears and arms aflailing

But the dying person always knows better

Is wiser, stronger and further along in getting sober

Than you are