Kenny

[saw]

Lies!
Lies, and more, they said
or were they merely distortions
of an abused mind, a ravaged body
really just a beautiful mind crying
for help
well, I loved you man, everything
your illusions, your re-creations
of yourself, the flip to the abrasive
world, it was okay with me
we grew up together, we played
sweet music in your uncle's basement
read poetry, laughed, philosophized
in the woods by the School For the Blind
with sips, gulps, of the Boone's Farm elixir.
I never felt betrayed by your obsessions
your addictions, your visions, the cornucopia
of wildly colored pills that lined the floor
of the van you took to sleeping in, living in
I always opened my front door, the back one too
gave you a blanket for the couch, never minded
the miles driving you to the Veteran's hospital,
but I really believed that you had finally risen
too high for the sordid hands of hell
that stretched up through the cold ground
grabbed at the heels of your cowboy boots,
trying to pull you to the other side
down the well, but in the end you dropped
the looking glass and it shattered
into a thousand slivers, each one
a component of your perfect soul.
The phone call broke my heart, they found you
in some filthy abandoned building
in East Baltimore, a syringe
pointing towards your peaceful corpse.

[dadio]

A really moving poem.

but I really believed that you had finally risen
too high for the sordid hands of hell
that stretched up through the cold ground
grabbed at the heels of your cowboy boots,
trying to pull you to the other side
down the well...

( captured well.)