RESERVED FOR ALL OF US
by Anton Wills-Eve
<a href=”https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_prompt/honorific/”>Honorific</a>
the person we all have to choose
RESERVED FOR ALL OF US
my world has closed its door
and thrown away the key.
Jacqueline was my everything,
as slowly I watched her die.
she took all meaning, love, and
happiness away from me,
in agony for both of us, I watched her
leave this life. God, why?
she did no wrong, unless to share
her love was too great a sin.
but in it I shared. And I was the seducer,
so why punish her?
the cancer, as it ate away her beauty
and wrinkled her silken skin,
was evil. It must have been,
to destroy beauty so radiant and rare.
I need my Jacqueline so much
I would gladly my own life cease
if doing so would reunite us.
but that’s a question I cannot even ask.
I pray, depressed and tortured as I am,
for her soul’s eternal peace.
but suicide could part us for
eternity; a truly pointless task.
it was her pleading eyes as she
fought the pain, trying to raise a smile,
that hurt me most. Please tell me why.
just nineteen. What did she do?
some say I shall in time forget.
what sort of mind, for even a little while,
could lose sight of her beseeching plea,
to end her life, asking me too
to give a fatal dose, saying sorry,
knowing I could not carry the Cross
of taking another human life.
she raised her face to say goodbye
one last time. I kissed her as her
humanity ebbed away. I felt the loss
so painfully, I could barely kiss
her happy face, while leaving her to die.
in my grief I do not know
if I eased her pain and killed her too.
I can’t blame myself if I did.
my love was stronger than my will.
my heart will never mend. Or,
if it does, I know I will not be
the same grief-stricken, broken
man, who today, on a nearby hill,
buried his heart and soul and every
part of him. All he could see
was a girl he loved. No other
mourners impinged upon his sight.
God, you cannot take my loss
away, or return my Jacqueline to me.
But thank you for leaving me to weep
alone, each day and night.
Anton Wills-Eve