Memento Mori

As the year comes to a close, it is time to think about
the last things, ’cause I’m failing to see any other way
to kill my persistent feelings than by getting knocked out.
I’m afraid that’s the only means to make them go away.

Throughout the ages many famed men have wisely remarked,
in different words, how life is but the process of waiting
for its end. For example, Erich Maria Remarque
claimed every breath and heartbeat is a moment of dying—

a little shove towards the end, since death begins at birth
and life is a disease. Both Joseph Hill and Jean Cocteau
second him in this, Jean saying: “Since the day of my birth,
my death began its walk,” ever walking toward him, though

without hurrying. Similarly, Joseph then mused about
how death borders on birth, the cradle standing in the grave.
But the wisest words on the matter were spoken, no doubt,
by Herodotus, a Greek historian (or a knave):

“Death is a delightful hiding place for [all] weary men.”
That’s the thing with the world: some people win it all at life
and some would better had never been born as these nonmen
are but a good-for-nothing mess, a disgusting lowlife

that is just otiosely taking up space and getting
on everybody’s nerves already by their existence.
Because of all the unluck they have, they keep questioning
what’s the point of living, their own value, and life’s essence.

No one can even imagine what’s it like being them,
being me, walking all life in an eternal midnight
of the shadowy realm of loneliness—what a mayhem—
although outside it may be a day and the sun shine bright,

because every time you try to step out and connect with
someone, you’re just mercilessly thrown back in disgusted
rejection, and that, repeated, sucks out all your life mirth,
and I’m left hating myself for having loved and trusted,

wondering why is it that people are always trying
to persuade the one who has fallen in love to stop
feeling so (as if it was so simple!) and not trying
to reason with the stubborn rejector to kindly drop

his prejudice and give the loving one a chance at least.
But I’m slowly starting to realise that however
painful alone is, it is a pain many times decreased—
it hurts times less than trying to please people by ever

striving to conform to their expectations of what I
should be like, in a beggarly desire to be liked,
when all they ever do is first mollifying me by
touching me in all the right places to make me real hyped

and open me up like a puzzle box, but when they’ve played
enough and found out what’s inside, they immediately
freak out and run away, leaving me wishing they once stayed,
dying for more of their love, broken irreparably.

And no matter how much I try to survive afterward,
I’m losing all will for living, since no one has ever
given me any grounds, not even by a single word,
to believe I’m worthy and mean something, whatever;

that I’m not dispensable. Rather the opposite
has only ever been told me, often indirectly
through people’s behaviour to me, and that’s the kind of treat
I never want to go through anymore, absolutely.

So from now on my only goal in life is to never
bother anyone, never ruin anybody else’s
life anymore, reducing my existence forever
only to work and church environment, because that seems

to be the most reasonable thing to do and safest
for everyone, but mainly for my heart. And I will pray
for a complete amnesia of all my past loves at least
or, better, for a timely release, if I may so say,

from the confines of this world. I wanna go where it’s safe—
in the embrace of Mother Earth and Heavenly Father.
Having nothing to live for, I waive. May He so vouchsafe.
For rather than to be in love, not to be is better.