You thought I’d never fall so low, but here I stoop

Surprise! I’ve taken to my sickbed with a stupe.

My malady came sudden, you’ve no time to mourn

My candle’s light flickers – I will be dead by morn.

You plead that I not go, tell me I am your world

It’s amazing how quickly your opinion whirled.

I had told you that I was decreasing in might

Begged you to lower your expectations a mite

And oh, your fury at this ask! It left me pale.

I felt loved like water feels held by a pierced pail.

When I grew too ill to last and became death’s prey

Like anyone else, for salvation, I did pray.

Still, I ailed – but in doing so I came to know

That should I prove hurt enough, you would heed my no.

When my health began to unravel at the seams

You finally saw how needy I was, it seems.

Recalled how precious that it is, this bond of ours

And cut me some slack when I neared my final hours.

The pressure you bequeath me will, at last, lessen

It’s when I near perish that you learn a lesson.