Death Rattle

I sometimes hear things That remind me of your last breaths- Fast and continuous, like a sprinter Trying to finish a course before running down: The endurance even of human frailty is astounding. I tell myself that life is a casualty experience at best; Your death is but one of hundreds, thousands, billions.. And I have to wonder what keeps the world from completely Filling up with those last hyperventilations Till there's no room left on any continent The atmosphere stretched taut like a greenhouse balloon So that it implodes from the inside out, the skin torn And the hollowed-out eyes raining down.