I wanted to be dead by forty. 

Instead, here I am

alive and breathing

silently seething,

dead inside alive

I wanted to be dead by thirty.

A wish that could've been granted

instead I ran.

Alive and battered,

shorn and shattered

A darker shadow than before. 

I wanted to be dead at twenty.

Without thought for my life

Fuck that husband and wife 

                 shit

Hoping for more

Following the script,

blind and tripped

More needy than before.

I wanted to be dead at ten.

Brittle now, brittle then

A little girl made of ice

Frozen in fear, living in a vice. 

So I tried.

Tried to be dead.

What were those pills?

I don't recall,

just a failed gesture

an offbeat measure.

I was dead when born. 

But all life matters

if you aren't the one living in that skin

            thinking again

I wanted to be dead by forty.