Last Words by Rita Dove

Last Words

I don’t want to die in a poem

the words burning in eulogy

the sun howling why

the moon sighing why not

 

I don’t want to die in bed

which is a poem gone wrong

a world turned in on itself

a floating navel of dreams

 

I won’t meet death in a field

like a dot punctuating a page

it’s too vast yet too tiny

everyone will say it’s a bit cinematic

 

I don’t want to pass away in your arms

those gentle parentheses

nor expire outside of their swoon

self-propelled    determined    shouting

 

Let the end come

as the best parts of living have come

unsought and undeserved

inconvenient

 

now that’s a good death

 

what nonsense you say

that’s not even worth

writing down