Answer To Death's Knocking Poem by Elizabeth Padillo Olesen

With fragile hands, death knocks
at our doors, knocking at day time -
noontime, evening or dawn.
With harsh voice, it knocks
when we lie down for an illness
which doctors cannot find out or
for an illness diagnosed as terminal.

The same harsh voice prompts
us to listen when accidents come,
when nature's fury meets our way,
when inhumanity of man
is unleashed even to the most
innocent in our time.

Hear the knocking of death
and answer it gently that
life is something to live for,
that there are loved ones
you need to attend to,
that your purpose in life
has not yet reached to the fullest.

And as you answer
your answer of refusal
to Death's knocking,
say a prayer to the one
who created you -
a word of total surrender
to his own will
for you.