Posthumous Coquetry

When I die, before sealing
my coffin, paint
a bit of rouge on my cheeks,
a bit of black lining around my eyes.

Because in my casket,
as on the evening he confessed,
I want to stay rosy forever,
with kohl blackness around my blue eyes.

Pose me without the sallowness of immortality,
without a pillow embroidered with tears,
on my pillow of lace,
which my tresses inundate.

On wild nights, that pillow
saw our brows together as we slept,
and on the black sheets of our gondola
counted our infinite kisses.

In my pale waxy hands
reunited in prayer,
wind the opal rosary
blessed by the Pope of Rome.

I will unstring it in the bed
from which nothing rises again.
His mouth will place on my mouth
each Pater Noster and each Ave Maria.

Théophile Gautier

The Gloom

When people think of dieing, they think of something in the final days of their existance. But that's not true. The moment we stop growing, we begin to die. Inperceptibly at first a lost hair, I line at the corner of one's smile. Then it accelerates, faster and faster the aches and pains accumulate. You can't eat this or you can't drink that. Your body just can't handle it anymore, By the time we check into the hospital for that final attempt to stave off the inevitable, death is already a fait accompli. All that's left is to close the eyes that one last time.