Death Verses

Three poems to help navigate the darkness of loss

***Content Warning: Do NOT read on airplanes***

When I was a kid, my dad had books in every corner of the house–in the bedroom, the living room, on top of the toilet, under the bed, you name it. Everywhere you looked there were books. He devoured at least two or three books per month and used to read Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea to me and my brothers every night before bed.  Like any good son, I wanted to be just like my dad. I wanted to read as much as I could. 

I can’t remember how old I was when I read my first full novel–Theodore Taylor’s The Cay–but I was young, probably seven or eight. After that, I couldn’t get enough. I loved immersing myself in stories, imagining new worlds, and–more than anything–going to the bookstore with my dad. 

I still do. 

Later, when I was in sixth grade, my English teacher, Mrs. Forbes, hosted a monthly reading competition. It was simple. Each student would keep track of how many pages he or she read and at the end of the month whoever had racked up the most pages would get a reward. Sometimes it was ice cream, sometimes candy, sometimes both. Whatever it was, I wanted it. 

I remember going to the school library and walking through the aisles with a stack of books taller than my head. Yep, I’ll read that. Sure, I’ll read that. A book about Earnest Shackleton’s expedition to the South Pole?? Sure, why not? John Krakauer’s Into Thin Air? Sounds awesome. The Alchemist? Sign me up. I’d have soccer games on most Saturdays and, on most Sundays, I’d nosedive straight into a pile of books. Sometimes, I’d get through two or even three in one day. 

I don’t remember if I ever won the ice cream, but I was definitely reading like a fiend. Shoutout to Mrs. Forbes for nourishing my love for reading. I can’t even articulate how important books have been in my life. They’ve shaped me in so many ways.  

Anyway…One Sunday in February of 2007 (this date is my best guess), I cracked open a book called The Poet Slave Of Cuba by Margarita Engle. It’s a biography of a Cuban slave-turned-poet named Juan Francisco Manzano. Honestly, I can’t remember much from the book, other than the story was written as a lyrical biography. That means Engle wrote Manzano’s biography as poems instead of chapters.

I’m not sure I truly understood or could even appreciate poetry at the time, but this book was my first introduction to the power of poetry. 

Sometimes poetry gets misrepresented as the lovey-dovey scribblings of some sappy, heartbroken writer who longs to woo his estranged lover. It can seem pretty cringey. For some reason, as a society, we’ve all decided poetry is not manly, or it’s reserved for the theater kids or high school rejects or whatever. Think of the slam poetry scene in 21 Jump Street—Slam Poetry! Cynthia! Sin–thi-uhh! Jesus died for our Cynthia’s. Beep boop! You’re dead. (I’m laughing out loud while writing this) 

If you look throughout history, poetry’s not that weird. Poets have been heroes and cornerstones of culture since the dawn of time. You know, Homer, Shakespeare, Rumi, Edgar Allen Poe, Maya Angelou, Neruda. Centuries and decades later, they’re still household names. Hell, Manzano, the poet-slave, is revered in Cuba, and so is his poetic successor, Jose Marti, who died in battle fighting against the Spanish colonists. If that’s not manly and cool, I don’t know what is. 

To be honest, I also think schools do a terrible job teaching poetry. They feed us all these rules, analysis techniques, and rhyming patterns. School, at least in my experience, completely drains poetry’s essence and purpose. Obviously, some of that stuff is important but I really think there’s too much emphasis on it. You don’t need to know what iambic pentameter is to write poetry. 

I really fell in love with poetry when I found it on my own. When I read A Poet Slave of Cuba; or when my Cuban grandfather nostalgically recited Jose Marti’s Cultivo Una Rosa Blanca with a glass of rum in his hand; or when my heart nearly exploded after I found Pablo Neruda’s The Light Wraps You in a bookstore. I still get chills down my spine when I remember its opening line: “En su llama mortal la luz te envuelve” / “The light wraps you in its mortal flame”... Why is that so beautiful? 

Everything you’ve read up until this point has just been an unnecessary justification for poetry–a long-winded way of me saying I love poetry, and I need poetry. Over the last two weeks, I’ve needed it more than ever. I guess I didn’t really need to write this entire prologue but I felt like taking a trip down memory lane and remembering how and why I wrote the poems I am about to share with you. 

Ever since I read The Poet Slave of Cuba, I’ve turned to poetry to try to make meaning of my darkest times.

On March 26th, in the early hours of the morning, my grandfather left this world. And while there’s so much I want to write about him, I do not yet have the words to convey the gravity of his life and loss. For now, I just want to share three poems I wrote about losing someone I deeply love. I don’t have any other goal for this article other than to share these verses that have helped me make sense of death. They’re not meant to be dark or depressing. I actually hope they inspire you in some way or another. 

So, I’ll share each poem and then a few lines of context about it, like an idea that inspired me to write it, or something I was trying to convey. But ultimately, I’ll leave the meaning up to you. 

Okay, let’s go: 

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1. Somber Dances 

We spend our days between somber dances

Always forgetting the slow movement of the clock’s hands

That takes people away from the light in our eyes. 

We laugh shallow laughs like there will always be more

And yet a tear from our eye falls slowly

Like it is the only water left on Earth. 

I have walked away from the shimmer in an old smile

Thinking I would see that wrinkled face again. 

But somewhere, in some faraway place within me

I felt a knot in my chest, I let the pain fill in 

Like a rising tide, and I asked myself, 

Why I was so quick to turn around. 

Why I held onto words I should have said.

Why I let scarce moments of beauty 

Slip away like they were as abundant as rain. 

Had I known, dear friend, that death was at your door, 

I would have filled the space between us 

With joy as deep as my sorrows.  

I would have thanked the God above me 

That your feet pushed down on the earth

Just one more time…
I swear I would have wept for you that night. 

But tonight, I dance this somber dance

To the slow rhythm of passing time. 

And still, tomorrow, the song will change, 

And I will forget the slow movement

of the clock’s hands that took you away 

From the light in my eyes. 

Abuelos dancing. My grandfather was an amazing dancer, even in old age.

I wrote this in 2020, long before my grandfather was sick. Even then, I was wrestling with the idea of grief and sorrow. I kept asking myself why it was so easy to sink into sadness so deeply, like quicksand, and yet I skipped over joy and laughter and happiness as if they were abundant as rain. In other words: what if I felt joy as deep as the pain of losing someone? Does that make sense? What I mean is, we are so present in the dark moments of our lives, especially when we lose someone. The darkness can seem never-ending and all-encompassing. But, on the other hand, we only really appreciate the good moments in our memories. We all know that life is short and yet we all seem to forget “the slow movement of the clock’s hands that takes people away from the light in our eyes''. 

To me, this poem is about gratitude and truly being present with our loved ones. What do you think? 

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2. The Pull of Souls 

Can you feel the pull of souls leaving Earth?

There is a change of wind, and gravity

Has untethered you from its warm blanket. 

The Earth keeps spinning and your steps get lighter. 

You look different now 

In all the pictures,

So gentle I could cry tears not meant for you yet. 

You are the premonition of a deep and painful absence, 

Leaving quietly like the slow recession of the tide. 

I am not ready to watch you leave, will you please     

Come ashore? 

My grandfather and my fiancée, Noa, walking on the beach in Panama. Shot on medium format film, June 2022.

I wrote this in May of 2022, ten months before my grandfather passed away. Back then, he was healthy and I had no clue that less than a year later he would be gone. I was planning to go visit him and my grandmother in June, and I think I wrote this after I had just bought flights down to Panama City where they lived. 

The trip was truly special. My fiancée Noa and I spent a full week with my grandparents, doing puzzles, visiting historic sites, walking on the beach, and eating at their favorite restaurants. My grandfather even whimsically took us to the town where he grew up, and showed us his elementary school and the streets he used to walk as a kid. After the trip, I saw him again, but only when he was already deep in battle with his illness. 

When I wrote this poem, something deep within me told me that this might be the last time I truly saw my grandfather. Maybe our souls were already saying goodbye to each other, but our minds didn’t know it yet. 

I really do feel that at the end of life someone can be both here on earth and in the afterlife at the same time. I’m not claiming to be clairvoyant or anything, but even ten months before he left us, something deep within me could feel my grandfather slowly leaving. So I grabbed a pen and paper and decided to explore that feeling. 

This poem is just a hug in the form of words. It’s me trying to hold onto him, knowing that he will soon depart.

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3. The Gift of Death

Death came to me in the middle of the night, 

To tell me that you had gone.

Its gift given so plainly, wrapped in pain, and grief, tears. 

I placed it on the table, by the bed where you once slept 

and looked away, unable to bear its weight on my eyes. 

What is it? I asked. Death had no name for it.

At first, I refused. Who would wrap a gift in so much pain? 

Then I thought of you, and the way you danced,

The song you’d play in the car, that walk we took on the beach, 

And I tore it open with rage. 

Truth be told, I couldn’t tell you what it was,

Only that it painted the world gold. 

Death’s gift took all I had, everything that didn’t matter, 

and the world collapsed at my feet. 

Then, it left me empty–a naked assembly of bones. 

And I turned to my mother, my brother with tears in their eyes

And the world was covered by a pure and golden light, 

And the space between us was full 

of a love so deep it made me weep, for all that remained. 

Death’s gift is a new beginning, golden vivid memory, 

a chance to feel how we should have felt when you were here, 

for those you’ve left behind.

Death’s gift is not free–the price is grief and tears, 

and pain as dark as the ocean,

But on the other side is a deep and golden light,

a love as pure as raindrops to a flower. 

Take it, and grow. 

The morning after my grandfather passed. My grandmother pulled her bed up close to his and stayed by his side until the end. This is what “…until death do us part” really means.

I wrote this in December of 2022. By then, my grandfather’s health was starting to take a turn for the worst. I was imagining death when I wrote this–what it would be like when it arrived and once it left. 

Now, a week after his passing, I know for sure that there is a beauty in death. There is even a gift that comes with it. I think that gift is a deep, deep love for all that’s left. Death has a way of cutting away all the bullshit, and leaving only what is pure. 

The morning my grandfather passed, I had never felt more love in one room in my entire life. Yes, my grandmother and my family were all devastated beyond words, but still, as the sun rose, the room was full of a golden light and an intense feeling of warmth. Even if just for a few moments, we all loved each other like there was no tomorrow, and nothing else in the world mattered except our love for each other. 

Grief is a form of love, and even in the deepest pits of sorrow, love grows.