Just Because, Bad Heart by Michael Lee Johnson

Just because I am old

do not tumble me dry.

Toss me away with those unused

Wheat pennies, Buffalo nickels, and Mercury dimes

in those pickle jars in the basement.

Do not bleach my dark memories

Salvation Army my clothes

to the poor because I died.

Do not retire me leave me a factory pension

in dust to history alone.

Save my unfinished poems refuse to toss them

into the unpolished alleyways of exile rusty trash barrows

just outside my window, just because I am old.

Do not create more spare images, adverbs

or adjectives than you need to bury me with.

Do not stand over my grave, weep,

pouring a bottle of Old Crow

bourbon whiskey without asking permission

if it can go through your kidney’s first.

When under stone sod I shall rise and go out

in my soft slippers in cold rain

dread no danger, pick yellow daffodils,

learn to spit up echoes of words

bow fiddle me up a northern Spring storm.

Do you bad heart, see in pine box of wood,

just because I got old.

Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era and is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada. Today he is a poet, freelance writer, amateur photographer, and small business owner in Itasca, Illinois.  Mr. Johnson published in more than 1037 publications, his poems have appeared in 37 countries, he edits, publishes 10 different poetry sites.  Michael Lee Johnson, Itasca, IL, nominated for 2 Pushcart Prize awards for poetry 2015/1 Best of the Net 2016/and 2 Best of the Net 2017.