Poem: I am Dead

I am dead.

But please, don't
Try to measure, the
Life, you think I must
Have had.  Because I
Was born this way.

You see:
My lungs don't know what it's like,
To inflate with the air of life.
My flesh and bones can only create
An illusion: me bearing weight.
And, my heart--my heart is stone.
I cry, I hug, I ache,
But know not a sliver of feeling.

Jealousy, love, hate.

I feel nothing—nothing real.

Do you know?

What it's like. To own a living life?

I've heard there's a way

To come alive for the first time,

To rip out this rock heart,

And replace depravity's hole

With something … oh, something,

So divinely set apart.

All I know:

Is that I cannot

make my own heart beat.

But, I do feel desperation,

And I so desperately

Want to be alive.

***

My Commentary:

My fear in writing this poem was that somehow, people would get a zombie feel about it. Our world has a good understanding of what death is. The news allows us to know about massive tragedies all over the world, and many movies and tv shows center around the death of a character or the potential destruction of many lives. But, my goal was to describe the moment when a person realizes that they, themselves are dead and are eternally in need of a Savior that they cannot be for themselves.

~ Alyson