DEATH OF A SCIENTIST

One low gasp
-then two,
alert the attack.
Wheezing
thrashing,
unable to draw breath in,
between half swallows
of slow congealing phlegm.
Buckling at the knee,
a thunderous timber,
splits his Adam's apple
in two lightning thrusts.
Lids drooping,
lips tinted Robin-egg blue,
rosy-cheeked bloom
swept into chalk,
panic distilled between echoes…

“Help! Somebody!
Is there no one to help my husband?!”

He veered off into heaven,
beckoning Galileo’s swoop from the stars,
but saw only coal and the devil,
and died– a broken man,
with one eternal reminder,
and the cold dead hand of the universe,
closing his heart to her forever.

@Nick Zegarac 2006 (all rights reserved).