The wise ones often say When one faces death – The eternal oblivion, The shared experience That makes us all kin – One sees with clarity The life that one lived With moments bitter-sweet Savoured once more, In a flash of a moment, In the blink of an eye... What I’d like to believe Is that we’d only see Some cherished memories: Passionate colour splatters Of careless brushstrokes That my mind once made Sloppily, on my rough, Rugged and grey canvas, Hanging on some wall Of a favourite hidden room, A secret trove of treasure In some recess of my soul… Memories like… How the lashes of your eyes Jingled like autumn leaves; How your giggle resonated With the babbling of a brook; Or, how the wind came to comb Your long and thick mane; Made willows green with envy. In the fall, they could barely Match its crimson luster... Or how radiant is your smile, With a single mark of beauty, Like a spot on the sun, A subtle signature Of a proud mother nature On her finest work of art... If death really brought, Sensations that sweet, I really wouldn’t mind dying a little bit, Every moment, of every day, As in French we like to say : Une petite mort, A little death, A happy little decay...

Image credit: Feature image generated with DALL·E using a prompt based on this poem and its themes.
If this piece resonates with you and you’re a visual artist, I’d love to feature your own soul-crafted work in place of the AI image.