Missing Poem by Dónall Dempsey

MISSING

'Oh yeah, funny...
...funeeeeeeee! '

I reach into
my lunchbox

pull out a sandwich
that consists of

a frilly French panties
between two clods of bread.

A neat calligraphic note
flutters to my feet

'Remember...last night! '
it whispers to my eyes.

And then a quote I think
from Edmund Spenser:

'Song made in lieu of many ornaments,
With which my loue should duly haue bene dect,

Be vnto her a goodly ornament,
And for short time an endlesse moniment.'

The lads
have a right guffaw.

'You lucky bugger...
...you lucky bugger! '

they intone Greek chorus-wise
their mournful mantra.

'All I ever get is
corned beef! '

moans the foreman.

I'm not laughing
I can see

the driver's face
distorted with terror

wrestle with the wheel
the truck out of his control

moving in
a world

of time &
no time

approaching calmly
their laughing backs

I staring Death
in the face

as it hurtles towards me
in slow s l o w motion

my thoughts scattered
into the air

I try to snatch them
back

I already dead
only these molecules of thought

bursting like bubbles
on the sharp edge of things.

Everything present and
correct.

The only thing missing
is my life.

My life.

A frilly froth
of panties

looking more and more
out of place.

The quoted poetry
crushed under

a dead man's
foot