Demise - Sharon Scholl

What a labor dying is –
this war against a body tuned
to the drum beat of existence,
impervious to the will,
to passionate desire,
even the loss of mind.
Its organs duplicated
against failure,
its molecules eternal
as the stars.

It shrinks to bone,
endures past loss of food
and drink, draws
on the primitive power
of Being itself to stay
anchored to this time and place.

We find the husk one morning,
life having left unseen,
departed like an army
in strategic retreat, primed
to fight upon another front.

Sharon Scholl is ninety-one and still making waves – small ones, perhaps, but still effective. She convenes a poetry critique group celebrating its twenty years of existence and fourteen collections of their poems published by various presses. She’s been a church musician since age fifteen, and maintains a website (freeprintmusic.com) of her original music for small, liberal churches. As a member of Beaches Watch local civic group, she is a veteran of many political campaigns. Oh, and her poetry chapbooks are available via Amazon Books.