tommy was eddie l’esperance’s brother
eddie my friend
who died at age ten
when the big dodge caught him
tipped him ass over head
dragged him from here to ramelli ford
and that was pretty far back then

tommy was eddie’s brother
and he was fucked even before
eddie died
tommy had two other brothers on smack
a father on the bottle and a mother
who looked sixty at thirty-five
and they all died early too

tommy was eddie’s brother
and he got killed a week ago
shot by a homeowner who caught him
falling out of a second story window
onto the back porch roof
trying to hold onto a microwave
in the middle of a half-assed burgling

i went to tommy’s funeral
and there were some fat guys with stringy hair and short ties
an actual smalltown cop
and a couple of tommy’s later kids all snotted up and whining
while his girlfriend kept going out for another cigarette

and there i was
and i didn’t know a soul
but
i went to tommy’s funeral
because tommy was eddie’s brother
and when i was ten no one was my friend
the way eddie was my friend
and he would have wanted that i think

but mostly
i just went to see
how much he still looked
like himself
and he didn’t

eddie’s
still the champ
at that
because after the car dragged him
his face remained intact

the only member of the family
to die and still be
beautiful

Our world is here, below us. The one we see
in the sky is not the earth for us.
Ours is dirty and impure. Ours welcomed us
as we were. Ours will hold us when we rot.

I ride this world as if Ganesh himself
had placed me on his back.
I will fall as I have risen,
and I am content.

I do wish I was nothing again —
just my mother’s desire, strong enough
to come forth and be, too weak
to be more than that.

I wish I was nothing again.
Nothing is worth saving.
Nothing sits in the doorway and thinks
before taking a step either way.

Some of you understand this: A tree falls,
and the elephant straightens. A leaf falls,
and the tree lifts itself higher. And what will happen
if I fall? Nothing, I pray. Nothing at all.

__________________________________________________________

(Eyes come open at 3 AM. Again.)

I believe I am afraid of dying in exact inverse proportion to my longing for certainty. Death is the only way to preserve certainty. If I remain uncertain, I remain alive. The more certainty I desire, the more attractive death becomes.

That pursuit of death — that’s narcissism perfected. I alone own myself, own my life; my need for comfort and certainty is all-encompassing. Taking my life away from all other people is the ultimate act of selfishness.

This is the standard response to the fact or the suggestion of suicide. I think, however, that it does not work this way for many of us. There is a form of suicide that is unconcerned with the rationale for it — it’s more of a reflex for some of us. Given a stimulus, it comes to mind automatically.

For instance: personal rejection, a stymied love affair, a financial debt, a wrong turn in traffic on a bad day even — any of these things may make the suicidal person suddenly split in two, and soon one rational half is watching the other half prepare razors, contemplate guns, research the dosages of sleeping pills needed for lethality. Half of your consciousness sits in powerless judgment of the irrational acts of the other half.

Sometimes it stops short, sometimes it does not, and it often seems a matter of chance as to whether you come forth from the trance.

Don’t judge the suicide too harshly, for I suspect that frequently he or she is as surprised as you that it happened at last.

And when the cat died in Schroedinger’s box, what do you suppose he was thinking? That was a suicide, of course; if you’ve ever watched a cat, you know they love to get into boxes all by themselves.