I Should Have Been More Responsible... Poem by RIC BASTASA

i should have been responsible for you
suffer for your loss
i could have drawn a map to find you
you are lost

it is this regret
that i keep on leaving
i, too, has a life of my own to live
a mountain to climb
a river to cross

a house to build or destroy
if i really want to
a grave to visit, flowers to throw away
to the winds

it is this disappointment that has kept me alive
i could have been more responsible
to each of you, sick and needing help
or dying and needing even just a prayer

but i too, has the time too short
to accomplish what i haven't
lots of unfinished business too
and so i cannot be yet taken

i've been empty, so empty that i begin to float
i drift like everyone else
still undecided where to land and be myself again
when i was just born


what i lost, i have not yet recovered,
my innocence, what i had was so much, this pride,
what i must achieve, seems but only a dream,
and it is not coming, no signal, no warning,
death for instance... oh,

i should have been more responsible than that,
i could have lived the life you've wasted.