Baby, It's Cold Outside
Posted: March 14th, 2015, 7:24 pm
Rejoice you are not here, flat dead with the rest
of us in one of those earthen plots where they chisel
your name in a granite headstone; instead we lie,
naked and useless, day in and night out, waiting
as an asthmatic waits for breath,
as a diabetic waits for insulin,
as a paraplegic waits for legs,
as a womanless man waits for love
This is the time to lie down and be counted,
to become a statistic lost in the columns:
the divorces, the college grads,
the deaths by tsunami, by earthquake,
by rope or carbon monoxide, by Viagra
prescriptions, the next order in a pizzeria,
ejaculations, the number of vitamin B12
pills in your medicine cabinet, next
to the sharp razor and mirror you look
into every morning and pray to God
for another day to live and breathe
of us in one of those earthen plots where they chisel
your name in a granite headstone; instead we lie,
naked and useless, day in and night out, waiting
as an asthmatic waits for breath,
as a diabetic waits for insulin,
as a paraplegic waits for legs,
as a womanless man waits for love
This is the time to lie down and be counted,
to become a statistic lost in the columns:
the divorces, the college grads,
the deaths by tsunami, by earthquake,
by rope or carbon monoxide, by Viagra
prescriptions, the next order in a pizzeria,
ejaculations, the number of vitamin B12
pills in your medicine cabinet, next
to the sharp razor and mirror you look
into every morning and pray to God
for another day to live and breathe
