Study of Regrets

Untitled (2018) — Jasper Johns

Lid closed, I’m stuck in an urn

It’s not a place I’d like to call home

It’s not that I call to the grave

(*ring ring* hello?)

It’s more like the grave calls to me

We are all so complicated, and then we die

My end on my mind

Demento mori

Maybe it’s the repeating 10.10 wins report

About two separate hit and runs in Brooklyn

Maybe it’s the aftershock of being stopped in my tracks by the corpse of a little mouse at my door’s threshold

Could be I’m mourning the home my grandparents owned since 1977 that was sold and is slated to be razed

Childhood memories discarded amongst childhood photos

I believe my soul is in each photo

Someone put a thumb tack through my 9-year-old head on the bulletin board

And I haven’t been well since