for David
It’s been over a decade
since we spread Grandpa’s ashes.
That was the first death.
When it’s hospital beds and oxygen tubes all over again,
your body is only 23 years old,
and no one knows what to do
except grip your withering hand
and beg you to come back, as if you have the choice.
Maybe you do.
It’s awkward how we gather outside your room,
night after night, trying to share the grief, but mostly
wondering at the physicality of losing you;
your father’s posture is the first to go.
Months later, after you’re gone,
they’ll want to know how it happened.
People get curious about these things.
I’ll look up and slightly right,
where that night we found you after the accident
suspends in my mind like a tragic painting.
It may be an uncomfortable silence,
but they can wait, and they will,
while I gently slide that picture aside
to reveal all the glorious ones before it,
stirred newly by their vibrant strokes,
those impressions you left behind,
the wealth of art you gave me,
which I will describe with an almost ethereal duty,
like a committed docent
who loves the artist for his textures and colors,
and is grateful that he lived.