A Selfish Request

Don't go before me, please stay awhile,
I want to remember your quirky smile
and your dancing eyes and the lilt of your voice
and the way you laughed when I gave you the choice
of marrying me, or something worse,
to wander the earth forever cursed,
unable to love or care for another,
and now we've become like sister and brother.
Grown old together, and set in our ways,
quarrelling, laughing and counting the days
when we are apart, two halves of the whole,
my morning papers, my Sunday morning stroll,
your Laurel to my Hardy, the quench for my thirst,
whatever will I do if you go first?

Don't go before me, have some regard,
life without you will be terribly hard.
How will I cope? It's impossible to tell.
Pictures and memories are all very well
but they'll never replace the smell of your hair,
or being in a room and knowing you're there.
Or squeezing your hand whilst you are sleeping,
or watching soppy movies and knowing you're weeping.
If you're not there I'll be missing all this,
your involuntary laughter, your goodnight kiss.
The way you wear your specs on your nose,
the startled look when you wake from a doze.
The Gods in their heaven will forever be cursed
if my prayers are unanswered and you go first.

If you do go before me I'll never forgive
the way you relinquished your willingness to live
and left me bereft of feeling, and more,
a ship without rudder, a boat without oar.
For without you, I'm nothing - a meaningless thing,
a quest without purpose, a bell without ring.
A pale imitation of a man that used to be,
blinded by a growing rage that would not let me see
any further than tomorrow, if you should go before
and leave me here floundering on life's barren shore.
For what good will I be without you in my life?
My friend, my companion, my partner - my wife.
If you do go before me, can I ask you to be kind
and don't walk too quickly - for I'll not be far behind.

?John Jones-June 2002