Issue/Publication: To be published in my upcoming book, DREW: A NOVEL IN VERSE

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i'm not sure what finally got him
whether it was the cancer
or post-operative complications

i'm also not sure when they decided
he would never be able to be himself again
to do the crazy shit that made him drew

but i do remember when they brought him back
to sylacauga so that he could die close to home
could waste away near his family and friends

he went into that hospital a shade over six feet
with two hundred muscular reckless pounds
packed onto his powerful vigorous body

but as the weeks dragged on in that cold bed
as those six feet became his length and his height varied
with the violent momentary heaves of the respirator

that beautiful youth that fountain of energy and joy
had become an old man huddled in a nursing home
who’d lingered long past the date he should have died

his muscles withered into bone
his body faded to a shadow of his former self
his soul and all our lives withdrew into that bed