What Would You Do

What would you do if you learned it would only be a year

          Could you do everything and then sum it all up, if it were so very near

What if right now you knew you had to leave in just 30 days

        How much would you try to experience and what goals would you raise

Would you find something different in the beauty of every sunrise

          Would you note all the last times like each was good for a prize

Could you possibly place everything in order and be prepared to unwind

          Perhaps you might simply determine to fight and to somehow survive

Suppose that you were convinced you would be dead by tomorrow

          If the colors seemed so much brighter, would that be simply from sorrow

Should you rush about trying to do all the things you had promised

         Or maybe spend time dwelling on something you knew you had missed

Would you consider their memories of you and try to change their tone

          Would you bother to get rid of those many things you still own

Consider that the plane is falling straight down and gathering speed

          How could you prepare yourself in that awful panic, terror and need

How much time would you ask for, if it were forced to be decided

          At that crucial moment, by what principles would you be guided

Would you even bother to watch your beloved TV anymore

          Would you pray for salvation or consider the void as never before

Who would you contact and what might you say

          What affairs would you attend to and which ones would you let lay

What should you do about your children’s future

          How might your spouse do without you to help and to script her

Would you sadly realize that you had wasted so much time

          Would you mainly miss daily actions of the most ordinary kind

Are there those you would tell the things to, that you have always known

          Would you expire inside or outside, far away, or in your own home

Would you keep on working until they carried you away

          Could you remain quiet or would you tell anyone who would stay

Would you turn to religion and let faith be your true guide

          Would you just end it all early and leave the priests feeling denied

Should your family interrupt their lives as you are expiring

          How could they understand the way your neurons are rewiring

Does it make sense to ease your anguish with pain medication and religion

          Why bother to keep up with your physical education

In this strange light, what message would you prepare for your children

          Should you spend money furiously on dreams to try and fulfill them

Would you sleep dark nights through or lie awake counting every moment

          Could you draw any meaning looking back on the blur and the foment

Should you take some time and write out your own obituary

          Does it make sense to fuss around cooking and keep being handy

What activities could possibly sustain you as you counted down to the nil

          Would you donate your organs and finally make out your last will

Would you still strive to keep your lawn well-trimmed and green

          What could you share with your grandson so he would see what you mean

Do you think you could extract some bit of wisdom from where you have been

          If you find ways to maintain will they conflict with what you have seen

What would you do first and what would you try to be doing at the end

          Would you swell hotly with anger and then collapse among friends

Would you choose peaceful narcotic fantasies or the blunt edge of reality

          Could helping others possibly ease the pain of your imminent fatality

Could you consider the fate of everything that you have been taught

          Could you conceive of a universe completely devoid of your own thought

Would you be able to draw any real satisfaction from your old recreations

          Would it help those you hurt if, near the end, you had some revelation

What would you choose to be the last thing that you say

          Who would you have stand by you as you finally slip away

What would you do if you had only a few short years left on this earth

        And how would you react if that time began the instant of your birth