Death Can Hurt No More Poem by Padma Devkota

In bronchial darkness where irate cells
produce cough and phlegm,
impotent against slow, slouching death
fear lurks long and thickens into
"So what? It's all the same!
How can disease harm the dead?
Having lived a life of one's own making,
one can't deny how absolutely breath-taking
each moment has been.
‘Tis less the fear of suffering
than one of losing the joys of being alive
that really pains.
But, so what, when having taken
the last breath in
one is no more what one has always been.
Death by any other name can hurt no more!

August 2,2012