Loss Averse

Maybe we only love life
Because we hate to lose things

More than we relish getting
More of what we’ve always had.

Tell someone they can have more
Of what their life is like now,

Expect a tepid answer.
Tell them they’ve got six months left

(Why the proverbial six?
What doc first came up with that?),

And watch them start hugging trees
And doting on each moment.

The sporting gods who made us
Made us to long in this way,

More attuned to grief than gain,
Just to see how long we’d stay.