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Bob Guffey

“if this was the last day of your life”

if this was the last day of your life

what would you do?


if this was the last day to taste

a peach or a strawberry?


the last day to smell the fresh

of clean linen or the fragrances

of roses and magnolias?


the last day to see the sky

and feel the rain,

to walk down your favorite lane

or up your favorite hillside?


the last day to listen

to Bach’s “Sleepers Wake”

or Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme”

or Carole King (ode to youth)

or Sam Cooke (ode to justice)

or fill-in-your-best-transcendent-musician-here?


the last day to hold the person

you love most in the world

and say and hear I love you?


what would you do?


I know what you would not do.


you would not spend the day complaining

about the traffic or the cost of anything.

you would not spend it in line

waiting your turn any place

or anywhere in the world.


you would not spend it allowing yourself

to be lectured by or arguing

with narrow-minded, small-hearted

people who do not understand

grace and mercy and forgiveness.


you would not spend it in

a thousand little ways that

in this life make for death

by a thousand tiny, nagging,

life-diminishing, complainy,

whiny cuts.


you would not waste your time

with dysfunctional people

who would rather suck the life out

of their friends and families

than give their lives for others.

as for me, if I were blessed

to know my last day, I would stay

nearest the people who are my home.


I would gather around me

the living and breathe one last time

of love.


I would say thank you Lord

for the journey so far.


I would say gratefulness is

a lot better highway down which

to live this life than bitterness.


I would share big hugs, have

one last drink of loveliness

then fade away smiling.

live today as if it is

the last day of your life

in this world.


live.


grace and peace,

bg

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