Momma’s Boy

by Dameion Wagner
 
 
Never called momma’s boy but I became one after you died     you knew that
nothing in the summary of your life was truer at that whole-body reverie than
what you felt at the prospect of slowly dying      an onrush of fearless joy like
falling snow
 
in the hang of dusk you had called an evening or two before—  
 
Hello. “I’m dying.”  I know.  “No, I mean     I mean to tell you     to tell
you that I will be dead by tomorrow or Thursday     I feel it now     I’m
lighter     my dry lips feel full-wet     the pain-patch seeped into my liver
into spaces where I had teeth     my dropped feet look upright and
controlled     the digging of my carpal tunnel has paused     my eyes feel
bluer
 
I had learned how to stay away long before you never made that call     even in
my fantasy you weren’t you because you never said much and had lost your
sense of even the afternoon in your wane     you wanting to die alone in your
room starving like an unwatered spider plant thinning and yellowing into your
bed that would be filled with another that looked something like you that ailed
something like you that stopped turning toward the door to see someone like me
 
knowing that you are really? literally? actually? empirically? gone momma’s boy
feels good but lies like I’m busy     lies like your card is in the mail     lies like the
tired nurse that ignores your call light when you ask where were you? when you