End to End

We die many times
before we leave this earth;
the first when news no longer
stops us, their strutting charms
a trade of tumbling blanks,
their ceremonies and sequins
mere ciphers. The next death
marked when we learn
what will come when we are gone,
the young and younger
forming cohorts behind us,
and those passed before
whispering welcomes in each
beat of wind or wave. At the last
all’s equal to us,
whether we carry on or cease,
hear the surf wash us to sleep, or
feel spring sun sting our skin, as if
the line between here and there
turned on silken thread,
an imperceptible thing.