The Way in Which I Prefer My Demise:

by drowning in the Pacific,

not because it’s pleasant,

(like dying in my sleep

during some subconscious,

midnight reverie),

this under-the-surface

suffocation,

but for the reason that

if I ever did come back,

as the Buddhists and

Hindus say I will,

I’d want to live in the sea,

its relative calm and serenity,

its teal and aquamarine,

with humans seldom to be seen,

my hands but fins

and a caudal for feet,

and death, should it come calling

once again, taking merely as long

as the cavernous gulp

from the whale's

insatiable hunger.

Andreas Gripp

Andreas Gripp