Let’s Furlough Death

I accept. Not Rage. 

If "time" was the drug dealer that panhandles at my corner, I would rummage and skim and bargain for your price.  I would swindle like golden toothed sailors and cheat like a low dollar whore while Mr. T spews the morbid facts and paints a grim picture for me to hang in memoriam at the foothold of my soul. 

You're alive and breathing while we prepare for your funeral.  "Normalcy" and "Responsibility" are the presents we're to give you wrapped up in black bows.  

I loathe laughing while you have accepted an outcome that hasn't happened.  I rage inside while my smile accepts your wishes. 

I want to build more birdhouses out of sheet metal with you in our saw dust coated garage.  I want to rock once more on your white wicker chairs and count the cars as they pass.  Let's go back to peeling shrimp with Grandmother and picking a part the nightly newscast.

This selfishness curls up like a slug in my chest; unsightly and unwelcome while you barter for peace.     

To tell you I want you to live is cruel when your body has already decided the outcome.