Unanticipated, a Poem About the Death of Self

Last Updated on April 8, 2025 by Candice Landau

This poem is excerpted from Embers & Amber, a collection of poetry by Candice Landau that explores love, loss, memory, and becoming. Note: some spacing has been stripped due to WordPress formatting issues.

This is one of my favorite poems I’ve ever written. Only through this imagery can I recall exactly what I was feeling at the time. I wrote this one on repeat in my head as I cycled into work.

He came for me
The reaper and his scythe

He took me like a dandelion
Stole me like the wind

I had no time to say my prayers
I had no time to plead my sins.

To his breast he held me near
I felt his bones, I smelled his breath

His gait was long, his cloak was thick
With me and other hearts he’d kept.

It seemed forever until he stopped
Till I could see where we had travelled.

The land that stretched before me now
Was red as blood and still with drought.

The sky was nothing I had seen
Bands of clouds a snake might make.

The color of the moon had changed
The stars around it also black.

And carefully he put me down
Unfurled his fingers bone by bone.

He moved away, he turned his back
He walked until he was no more.

I thought how strange to bring me here
Without a reason to let me go.