Post Mortem Poem by Mary Champion

As consciousness resurfaced, she took stock of her surroundings.
All around were soft voices she was unable to make out*
and yet the words, indistinct as they were, somehow offered comfort.

Slowly memory returned.
She had been watching TV - a bit boring really. She remembered her eyelids growing heavy, then somehow, she was floating high above, feeling unfettered, carefree,
weightless.

Looking down she saw an elderly woman asleep in a chair.
'Poor old dear, ' she had thought to herself, 'looks like she's on her last legs… funny… I have a dress just like that … wonder where she got hers.'

It was only then that she had realised -
the old lady was her or, more accurately, she reflected, had once been her.
It all became rather scary then until, mercifully, everything went dark and the next thing she had been aware of was hearing the angelic voices.

Anxiously, apprehensively she looked around her.
Where was this place?
She was beginning to suspect that she was probably dead.
In view of this possibility, she began to consider her past misdemeanours. Some made her cringe with embarrassment now, though she had enjoyed them well enough at the time.
She heard the echo of disapproving voices: nothing soothing or reassuring in their tones.
'You wicked girl, carry on like this and you will be damned to hell.'
How she had laughed.
Now she wasn't so sure.
But the soft voices were becoming more distinct -
so welcoming, so full of love.
Surely, she thought, they had to be angels and if they were angels, this couldn't be Hell, could it?
She was surrounded by angels,
and angels dwell in a timeless, glorious realm