Last Life in Death (RETRO) - edit 2

[dukealien]

Last Life in Death (RETRO)


What must it be to drift unpeacefully,
not recognizing nurse or child or bed– 
while soul churns after memory has fled–
to see and search and veer meaninglessly
trapped in a breathing body, nearly dead?
Vain steeplechasing thoughts find neither name
nor reason, none to help or even blame,
forgetting words those gathered used or said.
Yet, though the mind is lost, it feels the same
emotion from its living body - fear
of all its tissues touch and see and hear
bereft of sense within its failing frame.
Someone will need to close those fearful eyes
and wonder if she’ll panic as she dies.

edit1;

What must it be to drift unpeacefully
while recognizing nurse nor child nor bed–
for soul to churn when memory has fled,
to see and search and veer meaninglessly–
trapped in a breathing body, nearly dead?
Vain steeplechasing thoughts found neither name
nor definition when strange visions came,
unhelped by words those gathered wrote or said.
Yet, though the mind is lost, it feels the same
emotion from its living body - fear
of all its organs touch and see and hear
bereft of sense within its failing frame.
Someone will need to close your fearful eyes
and wonder if she’ll panic as she dies.


original version;

What must it be to die unpeacefully,
not recognizing nurse or child or bed–
for mind to live when memory has fled,
to see and move and think  meaninglessly
trapped in a body, whole though nearly dead,
thoughts racing courses without knowing what
each thing perceived is called not having got
a clue from what those gathered say or said?
Yet though the mind is lost it still has brought
emotion from its living body - fear
of all its organs feel and see and hear
but cannot name in helpless, lonely thought.
Someone will have to close your frightened eyes
and wonder if she’ll panic as she dies.

---

[NAPM 2022 #15 - The form is pretty tight, but there are flaws as this was written quickly]