The Crow

Death hunts me like a crow to a skeletal carcass - 
a husk of myself, still ripe for the picking because there’s somehow marrow left on these bones. 
When it seems I’m finally hollowed out, 
thus begins another round of feverish pecking at my frame.
Those marvels are said to represent transformation  -  and yet life feels perilously the same. 
The days trickle on, and I’m still here,
wondering why I never get the reprieve my body craves.

Waking in the night, the room spinning madly;
frenetic rapping in my chest,
why can’t I catch my breath? 
They’re leaving quicker than the eye can follow,
souls slinking along moonlit paths -  
up, up, up. 
I thought I had more time,
running with my right hand towards the sky.
I’m calling out,
throwing my chest behind my voice,
my heart a stone in my throat - 
I thought it was in a box under my bed.
… Who will there be in the end?

Photograph: Infinite Dream by Welder Wings