The flower doesn't ask to bloom;
Nor does it whisper,  "I will one day die. "
It's aware of its penultimate doom,
But yet, it lives; it's aware of its life.

Like the classics, they are survivors.

The Hemingways, with their red rage.
The Fitzgerald's, as innocent as lilacs.
Those Bukowskis; that smell of sage
Splattered all over their heart attacks.

Like the classics, they are survivors.

The touch of the Woolf's; bliss.
The smell of the Sexton's; pain
The look of the Plath's; abyss.
These flowers; victims of the honest brain

Like the classics, they are survivors.

Like the flower, they all had to bloom.
It was the start of their doom.
Those heavenly colors, like their words,
Are survivors, yet somehow, absurd.

Like the classics, they are survivors.

I am in debt to you all.
I write in your honor.
To continue this cycle of death;
Now there's your writer.