There’s never enough time (yet we’re counting cracks)
There’s never an honest line (spat through yellow teeth)
There’s never a clever rhyme (though we’re all geniuses)

Sometimes we’re sick of it (that is, when we think of it)
Balled up fists (nostrils inflamed by ****)
Plug me in to your escape
Charge this battery so it’s fit to last
Inject me with a reality where this is no past

A blank page, for a dead pen
A pretty cover (illustrated by a pretty color)
Flip fast; ignore the digits
Until, alas, we’ve reached the end

(but how did it start?)

Details forgotten; ****** lacking purpose
And we’re left with a spine that snaps
Decayed oak fluttering to linoleum
Bleeding dry ink (cannot refill)
Consumed by second thoughts

(but was there a first?)

Distorted lips agape
(cannot tell
top(?)
from    
bottom(?))

Wrinkles circling bloodshot eyes

(parentheses for what others see and others don’t)

And then we fade away
Drowned in transgressing whiteout

(but where is our epilogue?)

[and therefore, our sequel?]