on the year of my death
I will be twenty-seven in a highway grave
marked by a mangled cross
of stygian steel and garden gnome shards
as the makeshift crucifix
of a backwoods Nebraska death cult
I hope they will surround my body
in their deer skulls and bear blood
mummify me atop a radio tower
so this unwanted ghost
can claw through car stereos
an audible death of gentleness
like the withered breeze that blows
before a hurricane
I hope every mother in a mini-van
of five or more
will taste the asphalt rot
as its flesh collapses in fly-filled chunks
and settles in her quinoa salad
I hope on every small-town Ohio Christmas morning
kids will smell sugar cookies
wafting from their oven
but when they open the door
they find I have rotisseried their pet guinea pig
they will shiver at the windowsill
and see my oblong jaw swinging
and screaming old-god prophecies
they will hear me wail that autumn was for dying
winter is for ghosts
and if they think life will sprout in spring
it will only be sixteen shriveled daffodils
that root in my disheveled ribcage
and if you pick them for your wedding bouquet
your fiancé will pry apart their petals
to a chorus of “he loves me not’s”
and smell the last gushing pump of my heartbeat
like the grapeshot of friendly fire
I will have died with no teeth
and no fingerprints
just infertile black dirt
beneath my nails and between my gums
the way I grasped and devoured
lifelessness even before the grave
the way my ancient Nebraska death cult
chanted my true name
and drowned me beneath an evergreen tree
because they too are sluts for irony
I hope I die neck broken one-hundred and eighty degrees
upwards so that I might make fleeting use
of these hazel eyes
to marvel at the pornstar curvature
in the sky’s celestial body
what I really mean
is that I have watched these stars align
to fuck over strangers
since the day I started truly believing
each sinister pulse of this nebula
was never meant for me and mine
so long as we still whisper slick gypsy curses
across each other’s tongues
I pray they find God’s outstretched
arm reaching towards my crumpled form
the final reversal to his creation of man
because if I’m not having fun
then no one can
I lived lime-green and severed
like a homecoming father’s front lawn
spill a beer on me before I leave
I am far too convenient
I promise I have stopped growing
on the day of my birth
I emerged a half-formed lungfish
drowning on a riverbank
choking on silt or guilt
and God why do they sound so similar
I was exchanged for limitless heartbreak
to my backwoods Nebraska death cult
they covered me up in dirt and sinew
raised me in a bleeding rural cradle
and taught me love is something
you tear from a dying mammal
and chew for spiritual strength
take my bones now Nebraska death cult
use every piece of my body
sip from my Saturnalia skull
and swallow my forgetfulness
take my bones now
I will be twenty-seven in a highway grave
marked by a mangled cross
of stygian steel and garden gnome shards
as the makeshift crucifix
of a backwoods Nebraska death cult
I hope they will surround my body
in their deer skulls and bear blood
mummify me atop a radio tower
so this unwanted ghost
can claw through car stereos
an audible death of gentleness
like the withered breeze that blows
before a hurricane
I hope every mother in a mini-van
of five or more
will taste the asphalt rot
as its flesh collapses in fly-filled chunks
and settles in her quinoa salad
I hope on every small-town Ohio Christmas morning
kids will smell sugar cookies
wafting from their oven
but when they open the door
they find I have rotisseried their pet guinea pig
they will shiver at the windowsill
and see my oblong jaw swinging
and screaming old-god prophecies
they will hear me wail that autumn was for dying
winter is for ghosts
and if they think life will sprout in spring
it will only be sixteen shriveled daffodils
that root in my disheveled ribcage
and if you pick them for your wedding bouquet
your fiancé will pry apart their petals
to a chorus of “he loves me not’s”
and smell the last gushing pump of my heartbeat
like the grapeshot of friendly fire
I will have died with no teeth
and no fingerprints
just infertile black dirt
beneath my nails and between my gums
the way I grasped and devoured
lifelessness even before the grave
the way my ancient Nebraska death cult
chanted my true name
and drowned me beneath an evergreen tree
because they too are sluts for irony
I hope I die neck broken one-hundred and eighty degrees
upwards so that I might make fleeting use
of these hazel eyes
to marvel at the pornstar curvature
in the sky’s celestial body
what I really mean
is that I have watched these stars align
to fuck over strangers
since the day I started truly believing
each sinister pulse of this nebula
was never meant for me and mine
so long as we still whisper slick gypsy curses
across each other’s tongues
I pray they find God’s outstretched
arm reaching towards my crumpled form
the final reversal to his creation of man
because if I’m not having fun
then no one can
I lived lime-green and severed
like a homecoming father’s front lawn
spill a beer on me before I leave
I am far too convenient
I promise I have stopped growing
on the day of my birth
I emerged a half-formed lungfish
drowning on a riverbank
choking on silt or guilt
and God why do they sound so similar
I was exchanged for limitless heartbreak
to my backwoods Nebraska death cult
they covered me up in dirt and sinew
raised me in a bleeding rural cradle
and taught me love is something
you tear from a dying mammal
and chew for spiritual strength
take my bones now Nebraska death cult
use every piece of my body
sip from my Saturnalia skull
and swallow my forgetfulness
take my bones now