But this week's issue has a treasure of a poem written by, Margaret Atwood, one of the most prodigious, prolific poet/novelist alive today. (The Handmaid's Tale comes to mind.)
Margaret Atwood and I are approximately the same age. She has pretty much nailed it for me in describing what this feels like.
FLATLINE
Things wear out. Also fingers,
Gnarling sets in,
Your hands crouch in their mittens,
Forget chopsticks, and buttons.
Feet have their own agendas,
They scorn your taste in shoes
and ignore your trails, your maps.
Ears are superfluous:
What are they for,
Those alien pink flaps?
Skull fungus.
The body, once your accomplice,
is now your trap.
The sunrise makes you wince:
too bright, too flamingo.
After a lifetime of tangling,
of knotted snares and lacework,
of purple headspace tornados'
with their heartache and rubble,
you crave the end of mazes
and pray for a white shore,
an ocean with its horizon;
not, so much, bliss
but a flat line you steer for.
No more hiss and slosh'
no reef, no deeps,
no throat rattle of gravel.
It sounds like this:
- Margaret Atwood
