Don't Say To Me "I Will Die for You"

Don’t say to me “I will die for you.”

Because you have died a little

Each sun rise and set

Each work day

Each debt

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You have died a little each day

Before my very eyes

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I have known that you were killing yourself

Because life was killing you

And that I, perhaps, was killing you too

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My mind will never be free from this shackle

As yours has never been free of your father’s

And he of his mother’s

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You say to me “this is the way it is”

But it’s not—

For some

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For some, life is a peaceful dream

Where their mothers and fathers wake easily

Where their every breath does not form the seal of their parent’s caskets;

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They will not know our ghosts

And these apparitions will not haunt them

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You say “I will die for you”

I say you do not understand the blow they have struck us

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These insidious voyeurs

Grinning shiny teeth as we grapple and clamor

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A false bible they have given us

To sit on their throne and say

“This is just the way it is”

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No.

I don’t have to bear their lies,

I won’t.

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You have lifted me higher

The backs of one hundred ancestors lay below my foot

Where you will lie

Lifting—

And I think you’ve forgotten

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Below the throned vipers feet

There is nothing but blood

And you are not them

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You say to me “I will die for you”

But I know the truth of it

They will go on draining you

Until they have bled you dry

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And you will believe you sacrificed yourself

And you will believe you have done it for me—

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So don’t say this to me now

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Don’t rest their despicable deeds

Upon my shoulders as a royal mantle

Don’t say to me “I will die for you”

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because they have taken you, already.

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