Fire

At some level everyone knows they are going to die. Some people it keeps awake at night and some it keeps in their house and hidden away from the rest of the world. Then there are those, usually young people, who all but deny this simple truth. The thought of our own mortality is more of an abstract concept for people. It's like a faraway country that you have never been to, but have heard a few people talk about; you know it is there, but you just don't have a solid, concrete, grasp of it.

 I think part of the reason for that is the uncertainty of it all. No, not that it will happen, but when it will happen. You read stories of people waking up, getting ready for work, having breakfast, kissing the wife or husband goodbye and then while driving to work a piece of pipe comes loose from a plumbing truck ahead of them on the freeway and before they even have a moment to register what is happening, a lead pipe has gone through their windshield and through their brain. A fraction of a second and a normal day is the last day on earth.

 I am jealous of those people. Their uncertainty regarding death never metamorphosed into something else, something darker and wetter. Something that slithers around you and crawls up your leg, nips at your neck and breathes hot and wet into your ear. Ah, to be one of the uncertain; how I wish.

 I know when I am going to die. I have already seen my last sight. My last smell is that of the urine flowing down my legs. My last taste is the bile coming up from my stomach, and my last sound, well next to last sound, is the Commander of the squad yelling, "Fire!"

Copyright 2015 Barry Keller. All rights reserved.