' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' ' Her Last Week On Earth Poem by Dónall Dempsey

The sea burst
into flames

turning up at the edges
waves crinkled & shrank

into
themselves

if only she
had known

that this was to be
her last week on earth

she would have
laughed

thought of it as a weird title
for a bad book

or the title of
a Dónall Dempsey poem.

The bright green forest
burnt to a crisp.

The sunset
(ironically)

catching fire
glorious with colour.

Her last week on earth
had been uneventful

not even meriting
a diary entry

except for Thursday’s
note to self:

“Sean has got to go! ”

The flames snickering
licking everything

with their fierce little
orange and yellow tongues

the heart attack
so sudden

she couldn’t see it
coming

the paint on the tip of the brush
looking blindly for the picture

perched upon
an easel

but that little touch
of cerulean

never getting there

the knocked over
candle

painting the room
in lurid colour

hungry for
the seascape

(she had taken
great pains with it)

angry at its
incompleteness

the fiery tongues
attacking the paint

like a hell-fire preacher
or an ignorant art critic

burning both sea & sky
forest & figure

at the left hand foreground
of the canvas

the fire greedily eating
the hastily painted figure

the fire now
eagerly eating her hair

like
candyfloss.

A passing man
& his dog

calling the fire brigade
beneath a crescent moon

as she slept
in the arms of Death

deep in the heart
of the fire.