I Can’t Believe You Weren’t Already Dead

 

I can’t believe you weren’t already dead,

Had anyone asked I’d have said,

‘Died years ago, never very well’,

I suppose it just shows you can’t tell.

“I can’t believe you weren’t already dead”,

I thought you’d croaked it one cold night in bed,

I’ve often thought there ought to be a sympathy card

Bearing that legend, 

But to whom would you send it, 

A common acquaintance or friend?

To decide would be really quite hard,

And anyway 

One would have to change the pronoun to they 

or he or she, and could you defend it-

The choice you made to put it in the post?

Supposing the dead man came back as a ghost,

And saw the offending item on the mantlepiece

of his brother or son, or nephew or niece,

and realised you had written him off, a decade ago,

or so.

Imagine his wounded pride,

If he knew you had thought he had died.