You can’t get out of this one, Henry, you can’t get it out of me, and with this bullet
lodged in my chest, covered with your name, I will turn myself into a gun, because
it’s all I have,
because I’m hungry and hollow and just want something to call my own. I’ll be your
slaughterhouse, your killing floor, your morgue and final resting, walking around with this
bullet inside me
‘cause I couldn’t make you love me and I’m tired of pulling your teeth. Don’t you see, it’s like
I’ve swallowed your house keys, and it feels so natural, like the bullet was already there,
like it’s been waiting inside me the whole time.
Do you want it? Do you want anything I have? Will you throw me to the ground
like you mean it, reach inside and wrestle it out with your bare hands?
If you love me, Henry, you don’t love me in a way I understand.
Do you know how it ends? Do you feel lucky? Do you want to go home now?
There’s a bottle of whiskey in the trunk of the Chevy and a dead man at our feet
staring up at us like we’re something interesting.
This is where the evening splits in half, Henry, love or death. Grab an end, pull hard,
and make a wish.
” —from “Wishbone” by Richard Siken