‘bye, amy

trying on a cracked persona,
my life an ode to overdose,
to all those famous suicides.
i get, i get, i get (instead)
an ugly, smiling warning,
a fat, pink face, a foggy morning,
a “stupid kid—not even close!”
whispered three rooms down the hall.
drugs i take, and took and took,
ears ringing, enchanted cow bells,
and the view of earth from outer space
inside one eye—like flattened alps,
dancing “floaters”, cartoon gulps
(read it slowly, it says gulps),
flies-on-shit on speckled book,
the mild suggestion, “he needs help”
perverse, third-person serious,
bright-and-sunny savage rehab,
put-on weight and pour-on shame
(still alive means who’s to blame),
calm so conspicuously detached
my name’s a game of hide and seek,
they’re waiting for me to make a speech
when out of nowhere (where i am)
i say, i say, i say “who are they?”
ha! they don’t know, either,
they’re the lebanons of cedar,
they’re the solomons of song,
the right and wrong of gong-show,
the target-shaped life preserver,
the flop down in the snow and die,
the what-is-death with no idea,
the sacred retro-fitting nurse
who never loses anybody—
who can’t let me—me—be the first.
du-wop.
no,
yanked across complacent stage,
dropping my notes page by page,
my voice goosed up to squeaky scales,
my words achirp like birds with smiles,
i terrified! i try to say,
“but—it wasn’t supposed to end this way!”
it doesn’t end, it never ends,
it’s forever these carcinogenic bends,
d. t.s that stand for dylan thomas,
hiccups, the shakes, the shits, bombs
that don’t go off—to the nurse
to nurse just like a baby,
sucking on my thumb of tongue for brain.
du-wop.