My Dear Red

Tell me how the regret tastes.

Is it sweet?

Countless authors have promised me a saccharine solution.

Is it the aged bourbon we used to sip?

The one that hid in the back, smelling of pine, in a wooden closet.

It trickled down my throat for a while,

But when mixed with rage, regret tasted of nothing more than

Red-hot coals and my stomachs own bile.

Is it true what Mary Poppins screeched and squealed about,

Does a spoonful of sugar help the medicine go down?

Though I know it's not cough syrup you're taking.

No, indeed it's not.

You chugged that small bottle when the liquor ran dry.

You always, were drinking, or snorting, or getting on some sort of high.

Perhaps it doesn't matter anymore,

As long as it coats your belly,

For the bouts of indigestion

That were caused by my actions, my hair, my personality, all so unruly.

Once, it was only to be soothed during slurred speech, and drunken tears.

I hear that the holes have formed in your esophagus,

And water drips between your ribs

Like a parched dead man, half-decayed.

Is it true,

Is your brain truly stew?

Cooking in that oven, and leaking through...

Through the cracks in your pots and the holes in your head?

And from what I hear, you're finally red.

My Red.

My color of anger and love.

Your color of fits of passion fit for when I hit a nerve.

Are the rumors all true?

Did bullets run you clean through?

Because you told me that the blood-soaked shirt,

Was all my fault.

Even though I don't remember taking any shots.

Then whispers started to kiss my ears,

Telling me stories about all your fears.

Shouts and screams about illusions and dreams,

That kissed your eyes even outside of sleep.

And that it was insanity who drove you past the point

And your hand who put you at gunpoint.

My Red,

Does the regret fill your belly, now?

If only, if only, we could have known.

Wait, was not your words before you left,

That you would never regret the day you left me for dead?