Choosing sides

A birth
A death
An operation
A departure

All happened across a massive expanse
That I cannot cross today
Or tomorrow or the next
Because money and time prohibit the journey

A relatively short voyage
Will allow me to briefly partake
In the lives I'm missing on that side
But the life on this side will beckon me home

Here I laugh and love and enjoy
Grieve and commune and live
And also pine for what I can for now
Only partake of in my imagination

Across the ocean
That is deceptively vast
Lies a world I long for
But here is bounty beyond measure

Forever torn
But still choosing here
Conscious that the other world
Holds the same fate