STICKY-NOTES

for your brain
comes preinstalled
from the manufacture
at no extra cost
to you; some work
and some do not--
as to why
we don't know.
They're boxed
& layered
with general divisions
& sub-divisions
like: Family,
Lovers, Sex, Food,
Pleasures, Pain,
Betrayals and
Not Yet Named and some
are left blank
with possibility.

Today, it was cancer
& The Babe & his daughter's death
at the age of 102.
I never had cancer,
never knew The Babe
and didn't know his daughter,
but I did have diabetes
and thought a lot about,
and gravitated toward,
dying & death at 11
seemingly going forward.
The Times had Julia's demise
noted & all I had to do
was click on it & there I was
at 12 remembering
The Babe not able to eat
the white of a hard-boiled egg
without blood
gushing from his gums
& pain indenting his body
into a jolting question mark.
My note had many
traumatic question marks:
how was I going to die?
how messy would it be?
who would be there
to hold my hand
and get me
from this place
to the next?
I was able to see
the starched white nurses'
starched white uniforms,
smell the disinfectant,
taste the bile
of fear, and fear
each minute yet to come.

I read his bio
61 years ago,
but it stuck
somewhere
in the stack
under Health
maybe Dying
maybe both.

Breathing
after the first breath
is dangerous.
It should come
with instructions
or warnings--
but then again,
no. they shouldn't--
it's a crap shoot--
let's leave it
at that.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019

BOB DYLAN

is going to die
someday,
but I hope I go
first--this way
I won't have to die
twice.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2018

WHEN YOU'RE DEAD

you're dead,
they say.
What do you care
what happens
next?
Probably,
they're right.
But
still...

Hart Island, Potters Field,
looms large...
a storied history
of paupers perhaps,
but it creeps me
the fuck out
lying in a trench
with 150 strangers:
naked bones, hearts
with cupid arrows I
don't know...intestines,
smells, colons, empty
skulls & differing
opinions.

If, by chance,
you've been breathing
on my words
for whatever reason
and you don't see me
for three months let's say,
knock,
or call,
or get in touch
with my nutty brother (maybe
he's still alive?),
just get me
out of the ditch,
burn me up,
scatter me,
preferably
anywhere
where I won't
be seen.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2016

CRAZY FUCKING GENES

Some of us
have noticed death
early on; that's not
necessarily
a bad thing.
We've lived
a life
almost
as a high-wire act
and was lucky
there were nets
of all kinds
to catch
our hearts
in its hands.

I pushed
& pleaded
on the accelerator.
I dared God
to get me
out
when I wanted
to get out
but he left me
to suck on the tit
of other mortals
who've been there
before me.
Yes,
people around me
died
unexpectedly
yet their deaths
were abstract
while mine
gave me
a kind
of buoyancy.

Now, however,
I notice death
everyday
in my steps
& in my breath.
I take notice
of those who exit
& why. Some
are younger
& some are older
but mostly
they're my age.
Some I've listened to
or watched; some
have even given me
pleasures. I note
their passing
& record their ages:
O, she was sixty-seven--I got her
by a year; he was fifty-nine
& seemed to be healthy, was
an athlete and I have him
by a decade; huh? seventy-three--
I have four or five more years to go.
It's stupid, I know,
to try
& figure it out. Let it
just unfold, I tell myself.
It can't be explained.
Chalk it up
to crazy fucking genes
& leave it go at that,
but I can't
do it--
somebody had to write
this poem.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2016

EXISTENIALISM--A MOST BITTER PILL

Sick
& alone
ain't so bad--
when young
but on the south side
of sixty
it fuckin sucks.

Wake up
& realize
nobody
gives a shit
about your fever,
your stomach,
your head or
your heart.
Nobody
to bring you
a compress,
a cup of tea
or spoonful
of forgetting,
or even
an aspirin.
Your ass
is exposed.
You've arrived
at the Stillwell Avenue's
terminal
of the soul.

Have a good
day.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015