My first child grew up and left home, and on his way he burned bridges that made me question our relationship. I felt at time the boy I knew was dead, so many of these poems angrily deal with his "death."
I am nearing 40 years old, so while processing my son's departure, I had elements of a mid-life crisis. It was like my quarter-century life crisis, but instead of asking "what do I want to be?" I found myself asking, "What do I want to have accomplished when I die?"
There is a good deal of Chekovian introspection and questioning as I processed my anger at him, my parents' death, and why consciousness ever bothered to lift its head from the pillow of non-existence and decided to look around.