Last Days

We are all marked men.

Our days are numbered: some sooner, later. The day ends and Eva breathes, the last to come and still. We wait. Move our youthful bodies by day, but wait. Yielding to death, the dying, only as an after thought. Thoughts of such occurred today, feeding and walking the dog, as usual. Living, as usual. Celebrating a friend's birthday, a young life.

From "Home Burial," by Robert Frost:

The nearest friends can go
With anyone to death, comes so far short
They might as well not try to go at all.
No, from the time when one is sick to death,
One is alone, and he dies more alone.
Friends make pretense of following to the grave,
But before one is in it, their minds are turned
And making the best of their way back to life
And living people, and things they understand.

His character speaks as though in opposition of this stance. As though we have a choice to follow one to the grave--to go as close as possible and risk the falling in, too. Are humans really wired for death? Dying? I mean, effectively embracing the death of another and living beyond?

In this time, it seems that we are more geared for life. Four hundred excuses strong as to why it is better to be alive than dead, when we can and will not know for certain, till then. I recall when my father's wife died, I had not, as of that time, lost any close family members and I felt lucky--young and lucky. I consciously remember considering what it must feel like to lose someone you love; the thought now seems luxurious. What happens to those left behind, I wondered? And then it happened...