one by one they dive into
that darker place just out of view
leaving us on the edge of the end
as they descend

staring down the abyss
seeing nothing there but despair
as above us, their ashes fall

raining down on us who are left behind
crawling, we cherish what fragments we find
memories, muddied with tears...

i can see it now, the everlasting silence
swallowing all in the darkness from which we were born
the aching inside of being without
solidified by bitterness and doubt

writhing in the mud of their ashes
burning our eyes with the shame and the hollow
as we call out to them down that path we cannot follow

"no!" the screaming
the grieving, the praying
the suffering...
it's all wrong.

"no!" denial
you knew them, you needed them
you can't see them...
now they're gone.

and they'll be no less gone tomorrow.