He came out from the crowd and grasped my hand
“Where have you been? So long since we have met.
But you were so ill, and you look so well!”
I kissed his cheek. “And so do you,” I said.
For we had both looked in the eyes of Death.
We moved apart with vows to meet up soon
Conscious that we had both been held hostage
By a sudden and unimagined fragility.
Did you see what I saw when light merged with dark?
Did you think you were immortal too?
Dying something that others do?
Then the radiance of knowledge that it would happen to you.
What shall we talk of when we meet again?
The struggle to live, the fight against pain?
Or shall we discuss that look on Death’s face?
Did you see it too? I think that you did.
But I guess we’ll keep quiet-for how to describe
That we journeyed there and came back again
And there are no words for what we saw
For we have seen the face of Death
And it was not unkind.