If I Were Dead on Decoration Day -- revised 2

If I Were Dead on Decoration Day

Would you come and visit me?
Would you plant the ground with paper flags?
Would you sprinkle down confetti
Like paper tears of paper grief?

Would you cry and moan and say,
Behind your paper mask of grief
"Oh how I wish...if I only could...
But now is too late"


Do not come on Decoration Day
Do not plant your paper flags on me,
Nor shed your paper tears
If you cannot love me now
Do not pretend to love me then

I am here, so where are you?
Far from me in heart and mind.
So far away you cannot feel
The love I bear for you

Safe from loving, safe from care
Safe from me or from yourself?
Love suffers and endures
It does not run and hide

If I am not good enough for you in life
Do not moan for me in death
Paper grief is but a show
That insults the tears of those who care

I am not angry, only sad
My love is real and it endures
And when it suffers
It cries wet tears
The tears of living hearts

Third draft, rewriting of a poem written in high school.
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