Étiquette : englishwriting

Your voice on the responder (It’s Ok, you’re just dying #7)

Your voice on the responder
A poignant gesture of civility
I’m busy working
While you’re busy dying
How poorly scripted can it be ?

She was busy dying too, your mother
« I wasn’t there » you said, with a sob
Were you busy working back then
Or just standing in a cold distance ?
Like we all do,
And you’re not worse than any other kid
Raised by a single child-mother

You don’t eat much anymore,
We tried everything
Easily chewable,
Fine meals,
Your favorite pudding,
But you’ve grown tired of it
Creamy pastry, something fresh and melting
Or just a bit of basic rice and soup
Please, would you ? Just a few bites.

It’s meant to get worse
I don’t resist the verdict
And I don’t expect you to
You didn’t want the chemo,
And we’ll never know how long
It would have kept you alive
Nor in what condition

Your legs won’t bear you anymore
On your bycicle they made miracles
It’s ground zero, it’s back to earth
But you’re not buried yet,
And it’s both a long and short way
That leads one to their final breath

I’m only asking you for this courtesy :
May you not go while I’m busy toiling for my own life.
It’s a bit off-topic, I know
But we’re all self-centred, when it comes to survival
Please have this friendship to me :
Don’t die alone.

New Year’s call <> (It’s OK, you’re just dying #1)

It was new year’s day
And my first resolution would be to call you

They’d told me about your cancer
And the very short remaining time the doctors gave you

I felt concerned, and regretful as well
That our friendship waited so long for a chance to happen

Too late was coming soon
And I just had to shake my confusion

It took half an hour to clear the smoke
Then I knew I’d heard a man yet so charmingly alive
That I wanted to visit him the next day.

Every inch of your appartment was so full of you
A baroque space of bric-a-brac,
Cheap collages made of souvenirs and diverted pictures
Set of boxes and little lamps, gracefully arranged

You made the coffee on your old gaz cooker
And we talked for a while
Mostly not about death
And very little about your cancer

I could be wrong,
But it felt like seing a longtime friend
Though we only got to know each other.

I knew I was gonna stick by your side,
Whether you’d ask me or not
And this meant until the end.

Oh, and I was strangely overwhelmed with joy.
A guilty joy.

Do it right the first time.

Let us do it right the first time,
And less room for redemption, amendments,
For « I’ll make it better tomorrow ».
Less chance for revival, resilience,
For « let’s have another go ».
It makes you wonder sometimes if our wrongs and failings
Are not just drawn by a natural impulse
To clean forget the previous night,
Or what we did last week,
Or what happened last year…

You can screw it up all the more
When you know it never matters for long,
Not in this urban community
Where you make ten new friends a night,
Keep in touch by attending the same bars,
And where whom you offended weeks ago
Rarely seems to hold any grudge,
As they probably acted worse, said worse, behind your back.
Or whom you rely on their discretion
Already spread the news and betrayed your secret.
But they’ll make it up to you, so you don’t need to get upset.
There’s so much heart to be received
From someone who did it all wrong
In the tacit expectation of having still another shot.
What if there was no second shot ?
At least in an adult world
Where you’re supposed to bear the consequences
Of your deeds and opinions.

Let us do it right the first time.
And less room in heaven
For the one sinner who repents,
Than for the ninety-nine righteous.
How seriously flawed can it be
That you should give more credit and consideration
To a single hell-raiser in penitence,
Than to hundreds of decent people
Just doing their best every day
Without any special want for publicity… ?

If you think life deserves a more novelistic approach,
As a good story-telling prefers harm to justice,
Failure to achievement ;
There are so many further chapters left to be written
On the basis of human duality,
For an epic that started too well,
For true romance and cloudless skies.
You don’t need to blow your first shot,
You don’t need to take a piss in the fountain of youth,
You don’t need to spoil beauty,
You don’t need to fuck it up just to make it more real.

Let’s do it right.
Let us take the first shot.
Let us go clear at first sight.
And only then, if you should claim for one more chance,
Would it be fair, as it felt right in the first place.