dying sleeping drinking smoking

i can see how death is like sleep. i can see why people want to die. i don't think they really want death, hell, heaven, or and end. i think they just want to rest. deeply rest. to be refreshed. i think they're tired. so tired they want to just go to bed and not get up for as long as possible. they want to dream a new life and wake up in that life. they want this life to be the nightmare and their dream to be the reality. to exchange being awake for being asleep. maybe this is what those who get drunk or high want. the altered mind is like sleep walking. they want to leave for a while and come back to something different. they want their mind to alter their world instead of their mind to be truly altered. sleeping drinking and smoking are not merely escapes. they are life jackets worn on the boat of hope. maybe this will all be over soon. maybe earth will finally be changed.

I'm watching a man die.

i’m watching a man die. he’s 29. he’s not breathing. i’m remembering the back up call when the officers are yellilng ‘code blue.’ they are seeing him hanging in his cell. he’s not breathing when they are cutting him loose. he is tying the sheet around his neck. his mind is made up. he is killing himself. God is with me... watching. Angels are watching. Demons are watching. Where are his parents, his brothers and sisters, his girlfriend or fiancée or wife? What is he thinking as his spirit is leaving his body? Where is his spirit going? I don’t know. He’s there, wherever he is. Heaven or hell. He is there right now.