A Speaker for the Dead
when a person dies,
and passes away from the immediacy
of knowing them in the moment,
I feel called to work to see them clearly
the totality of who they were inside,
and in how they acted, and reacted, upon the world,
the sum total of who they were
more enticing and intriguing
than a sanitized version
which only speaks of the surface,
and then only of the accolades,
who each of us is is far more
than the nice things to say,
what strikes me as most true
is to chronicle the whole story, as best I can,
and then to appreciate how well the race was run,
despite the debilitating weights the runner had to also carry,
I wonder at the self-doubt within each of us
that is afraid that we are but imposter,
so we deny our own feet of clay
and fear noticing anything about those gone
that might push us to notice uncomfortable truths about ourselves
I want to celebrate the life lived
both for its successes and its struggles,
and I hope that my life, once ended,
can receive such honest love and appreciation.
by Henry H. Walker,
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