The spirit which is borne within us
which we adopt, play host to, even call our own
returns to whence it came upon our death
(or even upon our lack of hospitality - for we meet so many
who lack spirit, and so very few who truly overflow)
But it does not remember us at all
memory is an attribute of flesh and time
No, as it leaves this corporeal symbiosis
it leaves behind the brushstrokes of the flesh
(memory, yes; pain, yes; joy, sadly; ego, yes, that too.)
For the sense of self is borne of solitude and separation
and cannot permeate that which does not exist in space and time
Your carefully nurtured piece of the infinite
is no more immortal than your eyes or your hair
(if you keep it in unsuitable style it will cut itself off!)
Although your soul no more dies
than do the atoms that compose your flesh,
like them, it will no longer be part of you...
10/17/00