The Secret is Dying

[71degrees]

You wonder what it’s like
to be different, to be piled
like rock next to cold water,
so afraid you could tip
at the slightest tremor

what it is like to be laid naked
on a shore on a night so cold
your teeth rattle, your heart
so terrified it may stop

This thought is not new; it has been
a secret for thousands of years:
bedrock, granite; not shale,
not limestone

you are so briefly human,
aren’t you? Then suddenly,
you are not, and over time,
you become so much hardness,
able to last forever, like the secret

Revision

You wonder what it’s like to be different,
to be piled like rock next to deep water;
afraid you could tip at the slightest tremor

What it must be like to be laid naked
on a shore on a night so cold
your teeth rattle, your heart terrified
it may stop

This thought is not new, though it has been
a secret for thousands of years: bedrock,
granite; not shale, not limestone

You are so briefly human, aren’t you?
Then suddenly, you are not, and over time,
you become like so much hardness,
now able to last forever, like a secret should