The gate leading into my mother’s weed infested garden
had an arched wooden beam above,
she called it a portal.
As a child I was morbidly gripped with death,
often wondered how it would feel like
being on the other side of life.
One day, when the other children in the street had gone biking
(didn’t have one and felt sorry for myself)
sitting astride the gate,
I threw a rope across the beam,
made a noose and put it around my neck,
then the gate swung open,
as pushed by evil hands and I fell off.
The beam broke, hit me over the head knocked me unconscious.
Woke up trying to remember what I had seen.
Nothing.
Had to invent a picture
and it resembled a tuck shop.
Told mother that St. Peter was giving away sweets for free,
she didn’t believe me
and was cross because I had broken the beam.
Wonder what she would have said
if she had found me hanging from her portal.