"You can't do whatever" The words out of you Like a drunk leaving a bar looking for a fresh new last You were not a man of But did your best to advice You offered me "You just do whatever" And I know what you You meant that I choose to do, I must not be aimless I must not simply spin this globe and go wherever I stick my Because 71% of the time I will end up in the And if I do end up in the ocean I can't do whatever, learn to swim
"You just do whatever"
The conversation came after you me about heaven me that you thought heaven would be specific to each person And that person would have their own version of it Then asked me mine would be
I was so scared to you, "I don't one" But you your head, as if a suspicion that school had robbed me of a belief in stories You "you don't have to beleive what I believe, its enough to be good. Be good" I will. I think about your heaven heaven would be the same haircut, forever It be a stick a dog and some distance A that always needs mowing A of pills in those short bottles and your real teeth back Because your dentures could never master that bottle opening you loved to do The first you tried it with dentures I had nightmares for a month Because I your mouth had fallen off Your heaven, would be before the war And after you met grandma It would be head cheese and blood sausages Other deli meats that would ensure you would ever have to entertain dinner guests And I would never be in danger of having my stolen heaven, would be a of raisins Problems that you fix with your hands I you tried to fix everything with your hands I remember the days I remember the They like tiny blankets, as if your knuckles had all gone off to bed Walls that looked like they'd something to get under your skin And suddenly made to pay for it I know you were an man Finger tips like spent shotgun shells, bleeding smoke cocktails of and singed plastic You had what people would call, "a temper" But you loved a joke, if it was on you Something that would crack open the of your chest and let the wind tickle your heart Just enough to let you know it was still You didn't always laugh, always smile You did keep a mental ledger of you called your "send flowers list" I remember thinking it was a thank you to those who got you But learned the truth after my grandmother added a thin layer of sand to your Because you refused to make own lunch for work You told me about it you picked me up from school that day You said "Grandma just made the flowers list" And I "Because you love her so much?" And you "Because I'm gonna kill her" Of you didn't Your version of kill two months before winter, Having a take in each of her coats a few inches So on the first day she one She with the sudden tightness And you stood there then said "Honey, I love you no matter how big you get" She did not And managed to staple your smile into a straight face When she told all of friends at work that you had to move into the spare room Because you couldn't stop farting at You often me "If I had a heaven, what would it be like?" And I told you that for such a word, if, is just too big to wrap my belief around I would not to the hypothetical But wish now I would've if it was just to ease your mind in the belief That I could be headed to that other you believed in I would you now how my heaven is here It was here, in the gentle warfare of your relationship Grandma volleys were traded back and forth Like cards between children who didn't care what the stats meant My heaven would have been someone in grade five finally willing to trade me fruit roll up For my tin of My hell was wondering "why?" Why would you give me for lunch My heaven would make you Cause I get the feeling you get to do that very much Through my hell, the night terrors and bloody noses the eyes black, bruised back, sneak attack, nap sack and winter coat hijacks You did best to seal up the cracks in my armour and made my heaven here I have loved to have made you laugh more To make your send flowers just once So I you now my if If is a heaven Mine would a post office And I could letters to yours The first would read "Hell's not so bad, they much let you do whatever"