Going First (Poetry)

I’d always thought that I’d be first
to blunder blindly through Death’s door,
but you went on and took the lead,
braved the darkness, left before
I even knew you’d gone.

’Though straight away I feared the worst,
I never really thought you’d die
and something in me still believed
you’d recover, by and by.
Then yesterday Death won.

Up Hope’s frail ladder, down dire snakes —
a small voice told me all along
the dice were loaded from the start —
unfair play, obscenely wrong —
No chance Death wouldn’t come.

The gap now widens, deepens, aches —
the bridge is down across the years
we knew each other. Friendship’s heart
shudders, pumping bitter tears
while shock waves chill and numb.

I always though that I would go
before you — thus my mind was set:
we would grow old, I’d slip away,
you’d be sad, perhaps forget,
enjoy a ripe old age.

Now sorrow yanks me to and fro,
tugs on anger, guilt and pain,
I’m robbed of what I planned to say
knowing we won’t meet again,
so nurse a futile rage.