To Sleep: A Dead Poets’ Last Words Cento

Since the day of our birth, our death began
its walk. We sang of pastures, fields, and kings.
Moose. Indian. Pale, star-distance faces
are going to the inevitable.
Only listen to the sound of the pines
when no wind stirs. If you listen real close,
you can hear us whisper our legacy—
fertilizing daffodils. Do not trust
the spirit. It escapes like steam in dreams.
More light. Fog is rising—let us go in.