Dark humor because my friend who killed himself was very funny
by Ruby Coyle
Posters committing suicide by
leaping off my bedroom walls
are more self-aware than
all of us. Everyone I mean.
Rhymes feel more important to me
than clarity sometimes. Sweet OCD.
I’m more jumpy now than ever since
counting the mice in my kitchen at night
is the nicest part of my day.
I’m curious
where dead people go, since it was just
your third dead birthday (had to pause
and count that on my fingers) –
maybe you just learned to walk and talk
dead. Maybe you’re learning
the dead alphabet and making
three-year-old dead friends.
Maybe
I hardly write poems anymore because
I’m scared of what I’ll make you
say to me. When you died,
did that feeling of being
the only person on earth
finally go away?
(You don’t have to answer that)
Also I miss you
and I wish you’d come back.
I’d break my dumb rhyming habits for that.