Bereavement

I wrote my last will and testament on the back of a Rite Aid receipt it said, ‘bury me in an unmarked grave and burn all I have left’ I tell my roommates that I am a mess of incomplete metaphors, a collection of malaphors and allusions no one wants to read the footnotes to understand.

I like to say that I want to die on a rainy day. All good stories start on a rainy day, don’t you know? I want to be lowered to the symphony of falling, falling—like all Good Angels do; Like Vonnegut says about innocent untruths the smell of ozone and chrysanthemums wrapped around me like satin, soft, calling me home.

I am not suicidal; I do not want to die the faded scars on my body whisper the words I dare not speak. Like all good tales, the kind we stop saying as all goodness goes with age and living— “once upon a time.” We like to look at lives like tapestries but they’re less like novels and more like sublimation: it feels like we’re always skipping something or another, doesn’t it?

I say we will burn that bridge when we cross it, a clear sign of a life well lived; leaving nothing behind; leaving everything to the imagination.