I am with Death.

She sits beside me on the couch but does not steal my ice cream.

She speaks softly when she asks to share the covers

for Death knows I fear loud noises.

“How was your day?” She asks.

She means, “What have you blamed me for now?”

But we both trained with Emily Post

and value polite conversation.

Let your gold weigh down politeness.

Drown it in a body politic.

Her body is as impolite as my politics

(or my body melting into the cushions)

Death is as grey as my memory,

Ocean foam before it vanishes,

A silent film.

I ask, “What’s it like to go unspoken?”

She meets my eyes. “It kills.”