I sing so loud that the echoes form into friends.

I'm rocking like a three-year-old,
counting back seconds like they matter.
The cinderblocks have moved in
Ash-colored and dancing in a 6x4 rectangle.

Books everywhere, read a million times
and stacked for exercise and a better pillow.
We all have to look good on our death day.

The librarian walks the rounds,
A black man with a rocky face.
Wiry glasses and a thick Georgian drawl.
He smiles the way I wish I could.

They always say that you
Think about why they locked you up,
Why they gave you a steel-rod door and a slit-window
That only a midget could slide through.

My eyes feel like they weigh more
than my crimes.
I killed a few men, I admit it.
Like I admitted when they cuffed me and
Set me in front of harsh lamp light.
In front of a filthy cop with knuck's
And the stamina of a linebacker.

Less than an hour until they strap me down
And pump me full of a chem-cocktail.
I still don't feel guilt, just anxiety.

She'll be watching when the first plunger
Drives down and fills my veins.
She'll be there,
behind bullet-proof glass.

The second plunger will drop
And I'll start to pass out,
heart slows down.
My eyes'll be locked on her sapphires.

All I'll think about is the cordite,
The stream of smoke rising from
My dad's old revolver,
The four deputies that took her out back,
Behind the diner, and did sick things.

Their chests and heads
Opened up to a flood of blood,
chipped bones, guts.
The bodies were made for more reason
than to make an undertaker happy.

My cell-neighbor told me last night:
Eighty-percent of murders are committed
because of women.

God, I hope she smiles.