I Won't If You Don't

I Won’t if You Don’t


At minus three minutes to my first breath when love was
the B&W noise of my mother’s womb Poet died peacefully in

my sleep at fifty-two in a room on Elm’s Avenue. At eighty-three
Poet died cradling my balls in a tepid bath on a morning that

lasted a hundred years. At twenty Poet died with the precision
of the Seoul Ryu Kyong Su 105 Guards Tank Division like an arsonist

stoking his chronic ashes Poet charred & died clearing through
boxes in the loft I found a note ‘Don’t die. I won’t if you don’t.’