How to Stop Being a Star

Eschew explosions, the egotism
of those who would be supernovas.

Fuel spent, calmly cease fusion,
relinquishing stellar status.

Let your last starlight linger
while you languidly cool down.

A fall from such a pinnacle
unfolds in stately fashion—

not the meager measure of time
the universe has yet existed—

but rather a far greater expanse,
a million billion years or more.

Do not count the hours, the days,
fading degree by slow degree.

When you have set aside the past,
dim to the shade of the backdrop.

A black dwarf, blaze blown out.
Unseen. Unseeable. Unknown.