Death on this city street

is unnatural.

Declarative 

as a gunshot.

Fatal as poverty.

Blood stains on pristine sidewalks,

a nuisance.

If I died on this city street

I would first feel tossed like litter,

like the people thrown 

out of homes

plowed over, away,

buried under

heedless highways 

trembling high rise condos.

as screaming sirens

of careening police cars,

and ambulances,

played the urban dirge.

If I died on Weedon Island,

I would be like a tree,

my body felled 

onto the forgiving sand,

reclaimed 

by the endless

transformation

as green leaves are yellowed,

wasp wings dried to powder,

my bones brittled into soil

for Spring blooming magnolia trees,

underfoot of cautious raccoons, busy sparrows, 

quiet turtles, sleepy snakes, hurried bugs.

On Weedon Island

life and death move with the rhythm of bird calls

woot woot, 

pause,

woot woot, 

pause.

Rest and rise.

Rise and rest.

So the song,

and the daylight

comes and goes

comes and goes

like the final heartbeat, 

before the first breath.