I’ll hold my own death as a card in the deck

To be played when there are no other cards left

I’ll slip into the ocean, unnoticed

And notify no one on a notarized form

Enter slow on a hot summer morning

Like that one-legged locksmith in cold rain

But I’ll hold my own death as a card in the deck

To be played when there are no other cards left

As time drags on and I thin and whiten and my beard grows long

I might look like Walt Whitman

All sunken-eyed and dry and without pigment

But I want to be spry as a newborn kitten

And I’ll hold my own death as a card in the deck

To be played when there are no other cards left

I want to open like the bay does to the ocean

With an equal portion of every emotion

Or soldier forward and be hard as a flat board

With the heart of an approaching asteroid

Let go and ride like a cat’s toy in a dryer

Stay true to my matter like a brick in fire

Wrapped in my long years like a spool of wire

Unspoiled by the foils of fame and desire

So I’ll hold my own death as a card in the deck

To be played when there are no other cards left

Hold my own death as a card in the deck