Creation and Departure

I've been thinking a lot about death lately. That sounds awful, doesn't it? From a Western World perspective, death is decrepit and morbid. We avoid death at all costs. Many years ago I started to notice the energy between people, and the energy left behind by people who are no longer with us. I then became attracted to cultures and religions that actually look up at death, that don't look at it like it's a bad thing. In Buddhism, it's another step into the next best life. In Mexico (Dia De Los Muertos is just around the corner!) they do not mourn the dead; in fact, they celebrate the dead with libations!
Of course sadness after a loss is a given. We've ALL lost people we wish were still here, laying next to us, laughing with us, crying with us. A while back I lost an old friend to a drunk driving accident, and I wrote this poem about her, and the unfortunate, unforgiving loss. I'm not here to make a point about death or religion. I'm just here to type my thoughts enough to make sense. As always please share your thoughts with me! Have you lost someone close to you that changed your perspective on death? What does your religion say about it?

The energy that we hold
Doesn't just disappear..
Does it?
Do the concrete blocks
Not hold
Our ancestors?
Do we ever really go
Anywhere?
I find it mighty
Hard to believe
That a god
In the sky
Has my achelese
Held between
Worlds
Because hell is never..
Or always
Depending on how you
Feel sometimes
So,
I don't know
That much.
All I know is
What I feel
Because what they say
Is true,
It is
what you make of it,
And we only really make
With our minds.
That's the crazy
Thing
About being
Warm blooded,
And this energy
In the concrete blocks
It has to mean
Something..
Right?
I feel the way
You feel
Because I feel you
And nobody is really gone
Because I feel them,
Right?
And when
Grand mammy
Dies
We know she's somewhere
Better
But when a life is taken
At 18
At the will
Of some metal body
Do they still go somewhere or..
Are they just gone?
But I really do think
That they go somewhere
Better.
I don't know,
Maybe they're
The flowers
We can't pick
Because we love
The way they smell
Too much,
Or maybe
They're the stars
We get to see
Beyond the fog
Sometimes,
But either way
They're somewhere.
Please
Believe me
When I tell you
They're somewhere.
I know
Because I feel them.
I know because
Nobody is ever gone
And I guess
Nobody really knows,
But I think
I have this one
Figured out,
I really think they're out there,
Somewhere