Damned If I Do

If in my final days,

I, the ignorant fool for believing in hope;

believing death a doorway into that glorious life everlasting…

Then let silly solace swaddle me like a babe.

Rock me gently into that cradle-grave.

Lay me down with folded warmth,

a gentle fall into blissful unawares.

That last lying be far more desirous to me than to dive head first toward my hole,

My fading final shout that “hope be damned all along!”

To plummet, vindicated, into cold hard nothingness,

Knowing the sum of me is a scrawl on a page no one’s reading.