Every previous time they’d dropped Death round
They’d always phone to say if they’d been held up,
By a contraflow near Calvary
Or resurfacing for miles and miles
Along the Road to Hell.
And even when they dropped Death round
To gather up my parents and my dearest, sweetest friends
They’d get here 7 at the latest
And Death would look round from DBeebies on the telly
When the doorbell rang and sneer
“It tolls for thee.”
But Death’s been round here now for months
And every day I think I must ring The Authorities,
And plead, There must be somewhere else
For Death to stay, with someone closer, some family,
Where Death might be,
Well,
Happier.
But dropped right in it, it’s got to me.
Death’s not easy. When we tried home schooling
Death just drawled with unanswerable finality
“Frankly, what’s the point?” and sulked for hours
While I searched all day online
For fun activities
To do at home
With scythes.
At least now we can get out
And meet Death’s bffs off down the park
Though if I’m honest, watching Death
Morosely hanging out with War and Pestilence
Push Famine on the swings has palled
As quickly at attempts to build
Vast hecatombs and
Mausoleums
With Duplo.
And now the shops are open too,
Though I glimpsed the gathering darkness
From the corners of my eyes
As we queued up outside Primark for new cowls.
Still, tomorrow I have promised Death
We’re going to the Zoo. And yet
Amidst all those
Endangered
Species
There’s just no knowing exactly what Death’s going to do.