Dead Man and the Voice of God It has been a long time since the seconds ticked from my watch, I first no longer heard their measure. Now when I go down, the sound of flaking flesh is the surrogate roar for that caliper of decay and haste. And now my tombstone is a marker of displacement, wherever it is, and waste; my plot is covered by the house above. I think I shall flit up into the world, cut out the sentiment for keeping close to bones, attachment that all spirits hold, called forth, as I am, by a greater voice, the voice of God Who bids me leave this loam, whispers, "Today we meet in air. Come home."
The Dead Man on Death After the deathbed and relatives, and before the pickling preservatives, which I, consciousness having passed away from the body before embalming day, couldn't feel, I, incorporeal, discovered for myself the dead can feel-- and think, observe, enjoy traveling, traveling about the plot, and singing-- singing with voices I'd have died to hear. If I could die again, I'd live without fear. We lack only capacity for touch, and so the living miss us overmuch after our bodies fail. We are alive. Death's a word for those who survive.
Fountainhead Jesus, can I be dead? Is that my head? bloodless,--cut off beside a spouting source-- so pallid, neatly sliced there on the ground. How do I see me dead without remorse? And why beside a fountain in a forest? How am I headless when the "I" remains? May I learn what the fountainhead means? And may I know its making? Pebbly vent, rounded and cool, what makes your water burst? O frothy base, transparent willow, scene of brightness under trees around a glade, phantasmagoria of dream cement, who is your author? Can you quench a thirst? May I drink at the fount where I am dead?