The Price of Life

What point has life

If it culminates in

Certain death

And when to die

Comes as a relief,

How do I go on living?

I’ve watched them die

The ones I could never

Live without

One by me

All seven lay battered

And broken at my feet

One is thrown

Mercilessly off a cliff

Falling, falling to doom

One taken by poison

Breath leaving the body

Skin turning blue

Shot in the temple

Too proud to protest

Death coming swiftly

I must once again watch

Your eyes dull, a knife protruding from your back

I feel your skin chill

A rope slipped about

An unsuspecting neck

A life suffocated away

Careless hands and a foolish move

Another life is lost

Your lifeblood slipping away

The teeth of the beloved

Sinking fatally

Into the neck of the loving

Can death be so terrible

If the ones one loves most

Are dead?

Can life go on

When deaths are watched over and over

Even if only in a dream?

I don’t want to live

If I live without them

My heart is torn

I cannot love

My love is invested

As far as it can

How can my death

Be of any consequence

Can I truly be at peace?

I can only remember

They are not dead

And nor am I

At least, not yet

But how much longer

Until I too breathe my last breath?