Take Pictures
If I could go back in time,
and talk to myself at 14,
I wouldn't say: Don’t do all the drugs
I’d say:
“Be sure to take pictures with your friends,with your brother, who cares if it’s weirdjust do it,take them all the time.”
I had dreams around the age of 16.
Where a woman would cry, and say she wished I could see.
That I was trapped to go through something.
She told me she wept for the pain she’d seen,
And that there was no other way.
I remember her well,
Now and starting at 23 in 2016, Instead of her in my dreams
I see my brother Alex
Confused as to how he died, asking in the driveway,
Asking me for almost six years now.
And when I was 20 I saw Johnny,
We drove together like we did when he was alive,
He said:
“It’s not that bad being dead.”
He said that he’s alright.
I told him how I saw him on the hospital bed, with machines keeping him alive,
“ I watched you hooked up to a monitor as my brother cried,I have the paper of the chart with your last hear beatthe doctor gave it to us when we had to pull the plug.”“My Brother got it as a tattoo,to forever remember you,right on his own heart.”
That was the first time I spoke
To a dead friend in a dream,
All the way back in 2014.
Then I saw Austin, who died in 2018,
I apologized for kicking him out, the year before,
It truly fucked with me.
He was with me when I first fell apart after Alex had died.
He hugged me as I shook, and the finality sunk in.
Then not long after he couldn't stop stealing from me.
He said that he was sorry,
Like he did before.
I told him I forgave him as I already had.
And continued to shed a tear, as he asked:
“ How is my dad?”
I wish that last goodbye when I kicked him out hadn’t been the last
I ever saw him.
He even said he promised not to ghost,
I guess he didn’t keep his word.
And now comes 2021
Garrett, one of a kind.
My closest friend
He really came through for me when I lost my Brother,
When I stopped using, we hung out all the time.
We met up and drank to Austin when he died.
Garrett, my last best friend.
I see him quietly looking down,
And so I ask him:
“What the fuck man? Why did you do this?How could you take your own life?You know what it does, you know who you’ve lostwho I’ve lost,”
He told me that’s selfish, and that it had to be done.
He told me good luck and that he’s never really gone.
The last thing he said to me before he took his life
Was that he forgave me for what I did as my younger self.
He wished me the best, he said good bye,
Then took his own life, right after that text.
I sit at a glass table with all my dead.
We are all handed a mechanical trinket
That spins and twirls, works harmoniously.
But mine just falls apart
The more I try to fix it,
The more it crumbles.
Piece by Piece, Gear by Gear.
And instead of enjoying the company
I’m trying to put it all back together
But everything I do collapses it further,
As it all falls apart in my hands.
Here I am today, I know why she wept,
So yeah, If I could tell my younger self anything:
“Take Pictures”
Because when you become me, that will be your regret.
-Brett Colby
Deep