Aces and Eights

Trying to wrap my head around some hard news I got about a family member. This is what came out of it.

Strained words

Like a concrete wall

Going fifty five

Gray full stop

Punctuating

One future

Heart stops

Your vision

Stretched blackness

Falling backwards

Blood settling

Cooling

In your veins

Denial

River flowing backwards

Over its own banks

Sweeping hope

Away

A tin can ripped open

By a guard rail

Made of s**t luck

Mortality

Rattlesnake sudden

Dry warning

Hollow rockface echoes

Unstoppable sting

Kiss into oblivion

Paralysis

It's time

Slow motion ice dance

Ave Maria through

Plastic coated copper

Neodynium

One thirteen A.M.

Brushing lips

Against cold skin

Against farewell

Against inevitability

So much sand

Slipping away

Gripped tight

Flowing faster

Through fingers

That never learned

Let go

Dreams

Like so many cards

You won’t be dealt

Just spades

Aces and eights

Never hearts

Remission

Description

Never using that again

One to five years

A year

If I do nothing…

F**k it

May as well

Right?

May as well

When life

gives you lemons

You give life the finger

And spit in its eye

Rage against

The dying of

The light