Epitaph Poem by James McLain

I had those times and watched how others lived.
Surviving times like those when others died.
One thousand years or ten sleeping I have died.
It is not from out side in my soul was dropped.
Dropped I watched by one I waited rising caught.
Freed by one whom is no other more.
Set free by slaves whom knew before, I was ever free.

So you have dying never lived, but living wait to die?
What leaving coming made you change my luck?
Is this the time when I forgot one regret and how I fought.
I lived and plowed for common means my harvest shared.
If it made my fellow man some none the richer more,
Where I have lived I have died, so many times before.
What my mind my body does continues to accrue.