5 Single Words

There is a poem I wrote several years ago that several people have written me saying how it helped them decide not to take their own life. Several people have asked me "How can you write a poem that can actually save the life of another?" My answer is simple, spend a day in bed with a loaded gun and then be willing to tell the entire world what it took to keep you from pulling the trigger. With me it came down to --- 5 Single Words There was a man Only 30 years of age Yet He found himself at the end of the road He had lost his job His career His money His savings What there had been of it anyway All because of a simple accident Well, not so simple of an accident For he was also facing the possibility The possibility that he would never walk Again He had fought Tried to look at every possible angle Until he came to but one conclusion One that a person That has never been in this situation Could possibly ever understand He waited Waited there in bed The bed that he was becoming way too accustomed to Until his wife had left for work Until the kids had been sent off to school Waited there until he was finally All alone Yes He had argued and fought This was against all that he believed in But there it was Hidden in the words of an obscure insurance policy To some He was worth more dead Than alive Surely they would understand He tried to explain it in a note He knew that God might not be able to But he pleaded for their forgiveness And he was afraid that somehow Somehow he might just become to them A burden This was just more than he could take So he laid there in that bed All alone With a loaded pistol in his hand Fighting a losing battle With the simple reasoning and logic That had driven him to this decision In the very instant The moment when it had finally come down Down to raising the barrel to his head He heard a whisper A voice Barely audible But familiar somehow 5 words That was it 19 letters That made him stop Who will find your body Would it be one of the kids Possibly his father That said that he might come over Or would it be his wife There were so many possibilities So many different people And that was when it hit him Hit him how really blinded He had let himself become He put the gun away And was very careful Careful that no one else saw how often For the next few days That he cried Some people would argue That this was simply his conscious That there really isn’t such a person As God in heaven But I know one man that will argue this point And do so with great reason For in the darkest hour and moments Of a 30-year-old man’s life God himself came down from heaven And spoke just 5 single words And if you haven’t figured it out by now I thank Him every single day of my life That He was there To give me the strength And the courage To listen Ed Roberts 8/04/02 At the age of 30 I had 3 1/2 gallons of 350 degree grease spill down both of my legs from my knees down. Two different doctors told me I would probably never get out of a wheelchair. By the grace of God I have climbed three mountains since then.