Definition #57 Promise

Horse Tail Lights

Promissory Note

by Galway Kinnell

If I die before you
which is all but certain
then in the moment
before you will see me
become someone dead
in a transformation
as quick as a shooting star’s
I will cross over into you
and ask you to carry
not only your own memories
but mine too until you
too lie down and erase us
both together into oblivion.

“Promissory Note” by Galway Kinnell, from Strong Is Your Hold. © Houghton Mifflin, 2006. Reprinted with permission.