Need to perform at open mic Thursday, looking for help on this. Five Lies They Told Me When You Died

The Five Lies They Told Me When You Died

Lie #1

“The funeral is the hardest part”, your mother promises, standing in the aisle of your families church

the two of us a boulder dividing the river of passing people

She is just as tall as you, the same bronze eyes and straight nose

she must have known that the hardest days would be the ones when we forget

only to remember with a fist to the stomach

Lie #2

“Time Heals All Wounds” my therapist promised me, handing me tissues to dab on dry eyes.

In October, it will have been two years since you died

On Tuesday, I wandered into a sex shop in Boston that had an entire row of chocolate penises

I knew they’d crack you up, so I started to pick some out for you

I already had three by the time I remembered

Last time I checked, healed people don’t normally stand sobbing in dimly lit sex shops, with an armload of chocolate dicks

Lie #3

“She’s in a better place now” your father promises me

hovering several feet back

worried that if he came too near that I too would crumble into dust

you had stood on the edge of the roof of the school sophomore year

admiring the lights of a city after dark

“there’s nothing after this you know” you had told me, inching your toes closer to the edge

“there’s nothing better, nothing worse. just nothing.”

i had pulled you back

amounting your reckless rambling to vodka fueled teenage stupidity

Lie #4

“this will make you a stronger person”

my mother promises me, stroking my hair with awkward hands

she talks of a childhood friend, dead of cancer at four

and in my mind i begin to construct a wall around myself

each brick cemented with the promise to never again become as close to someone as to you

lest they too would take little pieces of myself six feet under

Lie #5

There Was Nothing You Could Have Done”

it was you who told me this lie, scrawled on the back of a subway map in spidery handwriting

i cant help but wonder if suicide notes don't warrant their own piece of clean paper

did you know it was lie when you wrote it?

sign #1 of a person who has decided they will commit suicide

your friends normally gray moods will turn suddenly sunny

she will really smile for the first time in years,

a laugh as rich as the chocolate you share will sneak out of her mouth

surprising you both

sign #2 of a person who has decided they will commit suicide

your friend will drag you to her closet

announcing she “isn’t really feeling her clothes anymore”

she will hand your armloads of acid washed jeans and band shirts

when you suggest a shopping trip that weekend for new clothes

she will hum noncommittally

sign #3 of a person who has decided they will commit suicide

your friend will confide she is having trouble sleeping

but her mom doesn’t really believe in those prescription meds

she’ll ask you if you know where she could get them

and the phone number you send her will be the last message she ever reads from you

https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/3icovo/pills_like_candy/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OCPoetry/comments/3ibjjx/sneakers/