i know there shan’t be silence

death
is a program
presented in surround sound

and as my last breaths blow
the air shall surely dance
with the music of life
carried from joyful backyards
hopscotched sidewalks
in through my bedroom window

my recessional

a cantata of children playing
the crescendo of youth

living

shy giggles
sing-song shouts
royal decrees of treehouse nobility
ain’t-it-grand gasps under an endless sky

life

•

and when these
neighborhood notes of our growing future
visit my horizontal ears

i beg

close the damn window
get me my noise-cancelling headphones
not those ones, the Bose ones goddammit

someone go outside and tell those kids to pipe down
show some respect
some of us are dying here
and trying to think about ourselves