Four Square Death

Death is the empty frame of a half open door

And the hollow echo of lost footsteps

Across a bare wooden floor

Death is the sum of four blank walls

And dirty shadows of missing pictures

Exposed nail holes

And old painted plaster 

Half filling the many fractures

A bare room with a barren bed

Death is a cold and clean fireplace

After all the ashes 

Are swept below and hidden from sight

A hearth without the warmth of fire

To fill a house with life's burning desire

Death is a squat little empty shell

An abandoned house on a lot gone wild

Once filled with life and laughter

Containing nothing but silent drafts

But hollow, vacant memories

Loose cob-webs in untended corners

And a layer of dust that settles over 

Everything that lies down

Death is

Days cast in dark shadow

And nights spent in sleepless reveries

With only creaking rooftops

And walls groaning obediently in the wind

The face of death is a look without pity

Without fear or remorse

It is an empty expression

Without regret, or loss or any real suffering

It is a face utterly without the illusion of desire

Or the delusion of life's temptations

It is merely a fragile mask

Marked by the wrinkles and folds of time

Any empty meaningless look

A blank gaze into nowhere

At nothing in particular

Out the glass of a closed window 

Or from the corner of a broken mirror

Knocked askew upon the wall

And

We always go peacefully into the night

Death is finally soft, silent and serene

It grants us that much and no more

No matter the kind of prelude

 The suffering, the pain, the violence

All left forever behind

Death knows no disease,

 No accident, no age, no anger or cruelty

These are only things life brings

The last simple moment of transition

Between this world and the next

Is one of final release from worldly cares

And everlasting relief from the bitter caress

Of life's double edged knife

Death deals directly and plainly

In the end

The final heart-beat

Death deals evenly with all

Whatever the hand in life 

We get and play

The cards are always put back

 Into Death's deck

It is a game played obligatorily

But without final winners or losers

Death grants us at least that much

No matter our merit or station

A gentle journey into the night

A guarantee, a surety, a warrant and a grant

A free no-return ticket

Of safe, graceful one-way passage

To the other side