Question of Life and Death
Yesterday’s The Writer’s Almanac featured one of my favorite poems of all time: Question, by May Swenson:
Body my house
my horse my hound
what will I do
when you are fallenWhere will I sleep
How will I ride
What will I hunt
I used to recite the first lines regularly and hearing that poem in my ears as I ran this morning and caught up on some podcasts brought home once again how ephemeral and fleeting experience and life is. I think I will return to reciting that poem or others like it on a daily basis. The regular reminder of death creates a sharpened edge to the day. The knife edge of melancholy and joy in the moment. The beauty of death is the grace it sheds upon the living.