It’s common knowledge that nobody dies of AIDS,
it’s the common cold or bronchitis or some other infection
that annihilates the broken immune system.
Alternatively, people with AIDS die
of suicide.
I didn’t even consider suicide an option
until you bolted your front door twice
and strung your neck up with a rainbow silk tie.

I don’t have AIDS,
I don’t even have the common cold or bronchitis,
but I do have a long gold cord under my bed
coiled up like a snake curling around its own head.
I do not want to die today, but I checked tomorrow’s forecast
and it sounds like the perfect day
for my madness to burst outward in hot yellow rays
as I choke on my own grey spit
and fatal sins.