And if I disappear, where would I go?
The silence left behind will not be heard
Amidst the noise. How long would it take
For anyone to notice the absence? And
Would it matter? Would any of it matter?
A church bell tolls, water gurgles,
A bird chimes another, as if in peace.
Life thrust upon us, an insistence of being,
An echoless voice in a chamber too full,
Is there any choice besides its negation?
I do not reject you, fellow prisoners,
I reject this, the sentence, the ruthlessness
Of being, of time, of life,
Of that essential loneliness that envelops us,
That wraps us all like a shroud since birth.
