Once the dust settles

And you’re left standing alone

Who will you call to?

To your friend? They’re gone

Your mother? long ago

Your father’s spirit guides you still

and yet gratitude eludes you

thankful could you have been several decades ago

for the decades that had already been gifted you

and yet here you stand still

letting the dust of the fallen fill your lungs so used

and before your own final cough

will you have finally found the reason

that you ended up here

in the first place