Staring into the eyes

Of black-and-white cadavers

Before their ghosts have left

As the last word of their entire story

Hang from frozen lips

Faces so full of promise

I hold between my finger and thumb

And look beneath a chemical blemish

Each now dead and gone

Still I'm awakened by the sentiment

Oh how many stories taken to the grave

That life is never

What's intended

That death is always

But the same