Corporeal Mist

The partition separating
life from death is
so tenuous.

The unbelievable fragility
of our organism suggests
a vision on a screen:

a kind of mist condenses itself
into
a human shape,

lasts a moment, and
scatters.

- Czeslaw Milosz
(found in The Sun, Sunbeam, August 2015 | Issue 476)

Young Man

I seemed always standing
before a door
to which I had no key,
although I knew it hid behind it
a gift for me.

Until one day I closed
my eyes a moment, stretched
then looked once more.
And not surprised, I did not mind it
when the hinges creaked
and, smiling, Death
held out his hands to me.

-- John Haines --