Vanitas
(A Panel Beater with a Heart to Lend)
 
Forget trauma centres and cat meat gaffs
when my flesh retreats, right down to the spool.
When keening kin start talking epitaphs
and when my busy kith begin to pool.
Instead, put in a call to the Panel Beater
with Planish hammer and a heart to lend.
Show him the face that didn't deliver
on a promise made way back when.
 
Don’t choke my clear skies, with gladioli
or attempt to sound out my depths.
When dieback bones begin to ossify
and compacts fail to catch my breaths.
Instead, put in a call to the Panel Beater
when my features focus and slice the sun.
Tell him bring famed heart and hammer,
the day my battle’s lost (or won).

Joseph Long
 
If you have any thoughts about this poem,  Joseph Long would be pleased to hear them