Our Vanishing
Thanks, no thanks, to eternal life. What pleasure
watching my old house broken-beamed, grey
elephant brought to its knees? White ash—gone
the way of trilobites and horsehair fern,
even the nuclear-proof cockroach in deep-freeze.
Cueballs knock each other randomly; reverse.
the tape and movement looks the same, illustrating
the end of time: things happen, but don't matter.
And if Lethe strips you like a swimmer
from his trunks, where will "I" be? If Heaven
without you is Hell, how will I know? A forever
of no-never-mind does not appeal, God's heart
a cold, contracting cinder. Give me the white light,
the slit of split-second calm, and knowing over is over.
Copyright Credit: Joyce Peseroff, "Our Vanishing" from Mortal Education. Copyright © 2000 by Joyce Peseroff. Reprinted by permission of Carnegie Mellon University Press.
Source: Mortal Education (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2000)