From the first seconds we are granted; life is escaping. It races out ahead, leaving us behind. Unguided and uncertain, we heedlessly go forward, hot on the heels of life escaping. No sooner do our bones firm up within us, than they begin to diminish and soften again. Organs grow to perfect proportions just so their symmetry can fail. Hardly a moment of beauty enjoyed before the decay begins. Supple flesh, vital muscle, a fleeting spectacle worthy of each tear shed in its honor, enraptured gaze cast in its direction, and full-throated rendition of any love song ever written. By the nature of being we exist this way; our entire lives consumed in spinning velocity. Nothing touched can be held, nothing witnessed can persist, and it is because of this that every impossible atom of existence is immeasurably valuable, and every instant of it should be adored and embraced most passionately.
When I see the countenance of beauty gently resting in the eyes of a child, I hesitate to blink for fear the plight of a middle aged man will appear in its place. The cautious smiles on the gray faces in old photographs reveal a haunted consciousness to me, aware in just that second of life escaping. Though they returned to brief distraction and seconds of reverie, soon there after life escaped them for the last time, eluded their desperate, clutching grasp, finally leaving them chilled and stiffening.
The eyes of a corpse reflect with clarity the emptiness of time and space, conveying nothing; no warmth, no earnestness, no desire, no regret. Liberated finally from all of the warm, wet invitations of living; to breath, to blink, to rhythmically beat, to pulse with vigor at the top of the mountain, to sigh with relief in the embrace of the beloved, to shiver, alone beneath the highway overpass. Not a single bead of liquid sadness can emerge from that vacant gaze. No gasp of joy will escape those frigid lips. A deep and reverently excavated grave is all that can be offered in recompense.
In the ephemeral brilliance of existence, the love that we share will only be repaid with suffering. Our dearest companions will be stripped from us. The ones we admire the most will disappear. The truth that fell from their lips, the strength that emanated from their hands will be lost in time, forgotten. Their sacred graves tread upon callously by those yet to be born, yet to grow up, yet to grow old, yet to die too soon, all in pursuit of life escaping.