Endings

The death was the same as the life in the end:
A messy affair over a messy landscape
In a messy world that had always been like that.
A hundred and ten pounds, and infinite space
And did that make the dead gaseous?
 
The blood had spread and stained
As only the horrific do.
Bled dry, bled out, and a white face
Stared at a white ceiling
Twisted in a smile.
 
The masks in costume shops
For Halloween, with white faces
And no eyes to speak of:
It lay there, attached to a head
And a skull, and it had been a face,
But the face was gone
And the mask remained
And the empty eye sockets stared up
As if wishing to see the world again.
 
And sickened splatters on the wall
And floor and ceiling and elsewhere
Were not the vile things.
Vile were the hands, stretched out,
Relaxed, casual. If she saw
Or if she did not, they did not know,
But pray a pose like that was not
Reserved for the expected.
 
She had said only a day before,
With a mocking smile and a quirked look:
“If we hold our eyes open,
Can we see how it ends?”