this is an addiction to life

I can see it in you, don’t try to deny your own eyes

(they’re fading, but still you hold on)

though you always did say that

you weren’t afraid to die.

smiling so brave, underneath so ashamed

to lie. but they’d all smile so sad,

save the tears for later and you never saw just how much

they cared (for the idea of you—pale and resolute).

but now that I’m staring in your face,

--forget the pain--

you reconsider living.

ah, but what to do? who’ll help you now?

they’ve let you go,

made their peace and said goodbye,

content to leave the scent of death with you.

hello lost cause,

it’s me. am I the one you seek?

it’s this or it’s that, but still not quite clear,

is that fear I can smell on your skin?

and I’m the one

who pulled the plug on you,

I’m the one

come to take your favorite drug away

(though much like sugar pills, air has little potency)

you tremble with withdrawal

struggle for breath with a look

(& that’s n-o- t acceptance—that’s the look of

the semi-conscious) .

it seems to me, white antiseptic walls have

sanctioned off the place behind your eyes.

see;

it’s obvious:

death has its way of making kin of all of us.

face so ashen, eyes with all the depth

of puddles.

(and you

just look s o

small)

so this is the noble fight, if you’d like to call it that.

I’d give such names, then, to traps well set.

can’t run,

can’t hide

(for the life of you…)

though you sure as hell are trying.

---no---) there’s only

giveup-givein

go down g a s p i n g

(all right—it’s all right)

as mountains and valleys collapse,

so you fall.