plural

bitterness?
two lumps please

I have baggage
plenty of it
though I do
not carry it with me

my baggage
sits quietly aside
safely stowed in
the overhead compartment
or tucked below the
seat in front of me

and should I
get settled somewhere
it is displayed
in my walk in closet
a shrine to remember

my closest companion
is death herself

no other has
accompanied me
so faithfully through
these many years

a lover
she has been
albeit a poor one

my dearest desire
is to be judged
for my sins

for in god's face
will I spit my
venom

when all is finished
and my sins
accounted for
page
after page

will I
recount
all that I have lost
and insist that
his just court
ignore it all
and sentence me
without justice

I want not his justice
nor his mercy
nor can any hell
be worse than
what I live in
day by day

at thirteen,
childhood lost when
I was given a choice
between a half life
of diminished capacity
or no life at all
I chose death

and it seems
in a mockery of
my decision

our lord
and saviour
has applied my choice
not to me
instead insisting I live
while all that I love
is basely crushed

the more
I tempted
the angel of death
the more I lost
those I love

as young man
I had nine brothers
those whom I counted
as of my flesh
as of my blood

and for that privilege
they paid with blood
and lives

Chris was the first
he died in my arms
in a pool of blood
from self-inflicted wounds
leaving behind
only a pictograph of
desperation
drawn in his blood

Then it was
Xavier, run
down by a
careless driver
and left
to die in the street

James
and Charles
died of
drug overdoses
with a month of
each other

Tom
might as well have,
he is the only other
survivor,
if you can call it that,
was made into a vegetable
unable to complete
sentences, of course
god's mercy only
lasts so long
and now as he recovers
to suffer the loss
of years and absent life

Nik died at my side
suffered a gunshot wound
to the head
I suppose suffered is
the wrong word
he was dead before
I could wipe his
blood and brains from
my eyes and pull him
into my arms

Jimmy or the
other James,
new york jimmy
as we called him
thought he could fly
and
nine stories
later,
learned differently

and Max
was never found
just his car
abandoned
with his
blood decorating
the window
a testament
to whomever he
offended

and lastly
sweet Noah
the only innocent
among a band
of devils

where each of us
earned our fate
and with
dispatch was it
delivered

Noah paid
in inches
and days
withering away
to nothing
devoured
by cancer

I suppose it is only
fitting that he
receive the
only natural death
among us

violent deaths
wasted lives
our merry band
of misguided angels

and the
jewel in my crown
of suffering
my saviour
Charlotte

a purer heart
I have never known
to say that I was
unworthy of her
would only tarnish
her by even holding
me in comparison

this trick the devil pulled

by opening her eyes
to whatever she
saw in me
and loved

in but a few short months
she changed me
from beast to man
and set a foundation
for life
that I can even now
not waver from
in my darkest hour

and early one summer morn
god glanced aside
and noticed our love
realizing the devil's trick
rectified it

I spent three hours
helpless
watching her faded
corpse without dignity
as they struggled
to revive her
the hand shaped bruises
on her chest from
frantic efforts

god plays with lives
and in the end
it is all a question
of degrees
for had the water
been three degrees colder
she would have
lived.

I lost love

in my grief
I begged the sea
and the god above it
to take me from
my broken husk
set me free
of my mortal coil
even hell
would be
a kinder place

god turned his
eyes from
my tears