Of all the things we do in bed,

from practical to thrilling,

why is it that becoming dead

should always get top billing?

For starters, you might think we’d hear

much more about the Sex Bed;

the Bed for Smoking, Snacks and Beer;

the Drunk-Text-With-Your-Ex Bed.

Next up: the Preggo Bed, of course,

and Birth Bed, fast proceeding

to Bed Where, Hungry as a Horse,

the Baby’s Always Feeding;

the Uninvited Toddler Bed;

the Bed-Turned-School-Kid’s Shelter

from Scary Dreams; the Dawdler Bed

for Parents With a Welter

of Duties, Deadlines, Dread and Doubt;

the Bed Where Counting Sheep’ll

Prove Zero Help When Teens Are Out

With Questionable People.

More beds will follow, naturally –

at times a true Niagara,

from Bed of Groans in Every Key

to Sex Bed II: Viagra.

The Menopausal Bed’s too hot;

the Slipped-Disc Bed’s too lumpy;

the Acid-Reflux Bed is not

a place to feel un-grumpy –

but soon the Grandkid Bed’s the thing,

As tiny Sams or Sydneys

dive in for books and snuggling

(and kid knees dent your kidneys) . . . 

So join me, friends: think what’s in store 

before they call the priest in!

The beds and beds and beds galore

that you will phone and feast in,

and sigh and roar and cry and snore

and make the two-backed beast in,

and spend (of course you know the score)

one-third your life, at least, in –

while trying vainly to ignore

the Bed You’ll Be Deceased in.

Melissa Balmain edits Light, a journal of comic poetry, and is the author of three poetry collections—most recently Satan Talks to His Therapist (Paul Dry Books). Her poems and/or prose have appeared in Rattle, Poetry Daily, Nimrod, The New York Times, The New Yorker, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, Literary Matters, The Hopkins Review, Ecotone, and Crab Orchard Review. She teaches at the University of Rochester and is a recovering mime.