A Hundred Ways to Die

You lose all your body fat, visible bones father

Hospice is here, the bed you read a thousand books in,

blanket over your face to sleep, snow outside, steps

from dogs and grandkids, metastasized, a sunflower

sprouts from your lungs, a sparrow on your disc florets, tomatoes green

ready to be fried, bottles full of beans left

in the basement, in a cool dark place, a pulmonary embolism

tumbling onto the floor, choking on what air remains,

mildly drowning when you are three-years-old, but not

enough to fully die, decades pass in a care facility,

a tube down your throat to suck the mucus, a disadvantaged

mom visits regularly, dad has moved on, taller you

grow among the tubes, nurses looking down at your crumpled

helpless state, no championships for you, no prom,

and not even a feasible death