“My Life Reads Like a Suicide Note”
© 2025 by Michael L. Utley

my old man died alone
on a busted sofa
on a September farm
in the middle
of nowhere
with a gut full of
prescription drugs
and a poorly scrawled note
left on the kitchen table

“something went wrong
in my head”

it said

he checked out
without tipping
the bellboy
the cheap fuck
remorseless
to the end

and in his
final act
on planet earth
he also killed
me

closure
wasn’t in
his 10th grade
drop-out
vocabulary
neither were
compassion
decency
empathy
love
his lexicon
was one of
unfettered cruelty
willful ignorance
narcissistic dominance
bigotry
hate
violence

closure?
there is no closure
when the bad guys
get away with murder
and speed outta town
at midnight
in black-windowed
coupes with fat tires
and skulls painted
on the hoods
glasspacks roaring
tearing the world
to pieces

there is no closure
when the deceased
can’t sleep
and bones rattle
restlessly
in coffins
and closets
and all
you can see
on the insides
of your eyelids
is the haggard face
of a seven-year-old kid
staring back
at you

so tell me
do you know
what it’s like
to be a ghost?
to lurk in
sunless corners
among dust motes
and spider webs
and choke
on the cloying darkness
that surrounds you
permeates you
to see horrors but
never be seen
to know fey secrets
that should
never be known
to hear with
deafened ears
silent whisperings
best left unheard
do you?

I’ve been gone
a long time
my father’s
smudged and bloody
fingerprints
all over
my cheap headstone
the desiccated yellow turf
of my plot
beaten to dust
beneath his
boot prints
isn’t it funny
how the dead persist?
you’d almost think
he mourned my passing
if it weren’t for his
soft laughter that
sounds more like
the cries of jackals

sometimes
in the wan hours
when the world
is asleep
and all is quiet
I push through
the sod
and float
on night breezes
navigating by
starlight and
moonbeams
among the
crooked marble crosses
and faded plastic flowers
of lost souls
and settle down
on cold dewy grass
and reach out
tentatively
toward my headstone
and weep
for that seven-year-old kid
who never had a chance
that child who died
and was reincarnated
as his mother’s protector
his father’s enemy
his fate written
in the blood
of the wound
he inflicted on his
father’s forehead
the scar that remained
until the old man
killed himself
alone
on a busted sofa
on a September farm
in the middle of
nowhere