Poetry Porch: Poetry

 

IF YOU DIE FIRST
by Robert K. Johnson

                    (for Pat)

will I wake up at midnight sobbing
face-down into my black pillow?

or, up at sunrise, prod my body
through daylong chores in the hope

I keep from exploding into fragments?
or attend a social mixer, chat

with a dozen women all strangers to me
while I try to convince myself

what's taking place is real?
                        —I have no idea
what I will do if you die first.



Copyright © 2010 by Robert K. Johnson.