Before the Afterlife Comes the Life-Life
The life-life is life-like.
The life-life isn’t long.
It holds the apprehension of the afterlife.
Like a testing ground, and ground down,
the life-life becomes the fading life,
the edges show, there’s fog.
Inevitably, we grow slimmer,
if not in one way then in
another.
Oh life-life,
you can’t actually be a preparation, can you?
Or, if so, for what?
The afterlife doesn’t need anything, does it?
Or is the afterlife lonely, greedy, unsure,
and the life-life its awkward little sister?
Or is the life-life the question
only the afterlife chooses to answer?
Or the reverse?
The afterlife is the question
the life-life cannot answer,
with pain at each border, the life-life
crying like the last born,
while the afterlife must wonder,
philosophically,
Will she behave herself
at my party?
– Lee Upton
from Salamander 14.1 (2008/09): 38.