Can’t Touch Eternity Poem by Margaret Alice Second

Desperately looking for an escape, can’t bear
my heavy heart - we have to part with every
physical thing, every pet, every animal, Junior
was old and uncomfortable - give me a new
puppy in his place, give me a small dog right
now, press my head into work, make the little
alien calm down, he’s screeching and I’ve
nothing to offer - tomorrow the SPCA

I’ll walk up and down looking for a new dog –
there’s a hole in my heart and it’s bleeding,
where can I run, TV offers no magic way out,
the alien’s locked up in my mind, there’s prison
bars all around and I can’t get out – I mean the
little alien can’t get out – he screams that he’s
trapped & it’s not fair that there’s feelings in the
cycle of life, my heart’s bleeding out and I’m

So numb inside, nothing’s forever but Junior was
and the words “inevitable” and “gone” just create
more prison bars locking the little alien so tightly
inside, he’s suffocating I’m being strangled time
stops to take stock of puny mankind who can’t
touch eternity while still alive…