Giving Up the Ghost

I did not see you that day,

Did not properly follow up

After that fateful doctor's visit.

I will never again see you

As you were in your prime

When the sunshine in your eyes

Reflected in your smile—

When you were alive.

Now, you have grown life—

and death—inside of you.

I see you, unresisting captive,

Held, helpless hostage

To an impotent mass of cells.

I see you gather dust in hell.

Seeing you now haunts me,

A limp ghost in a lithe body.

I would rather not see you at all.