I don’t sleep very well
But that doesn’t explain
The feeling I have this morning
That if I’m dead, I don’t know it.
Just as we can dream we’re awake when we aren’t
If I died in my sleep last night, or a month ago,
What would feel different
From how I feel this morning?
What actually stands out from this making coffee
This writing in my journal, this faithful
Answering emails from From’s I recognize
Always remembering a past and anticipating a future?
My wife and I were walking the dogs this afternoon,
A four-by-four wobbling down the sidewalk,
When a burst of wind awakened the ponderosa branches
Until two trucks roared past and drowned their lifting chords.
I hope I haven’t died yet.
What a disappointment if my life just ends
Like a dream with no hero
A Who Done It with no mystery solved.
But if it hasn’t happened yet
Is it too late to feel grateful for all of this
And to practice for the unknown moment
This persevering body finally says Goodbye?
The Life Lived Late
The life lived late is far better
than the life not lived,
the life never fulfilled.
The life lived belatedly and finally owned
is far better than a life always disowned.
Is it that you had to earn the right?
Or is it that you had to overcome fright?
Maybe it’s not cowardice or fear.
It’s just that you couldn’t get there from here.
When all obligations have been met
but the inner voice still says, “Not yet,”
it’s time to repeat the cliché
“If not now, when?” and for you to make your way.
Solace is found in aligning
where dignity and humility are binding.
You are not controlling the outcome—
your intuition is here to be acted upon.
The lived experience may be quiet, even indirect.
Yet your inner longing and the life lived now connect.
By Phillip Moffitt, 2025
(Unpublished)
Or as Monty Python says in it’s vast wisdom…” I’m not dead yet”
Nice poem Michael!