One More Bullet by Steve Lane

Just                                                              one.

 

 

 

 

 

One more high–speed fuck–up   …    ……..tequila–fueled  fear–induced  ham–fisted

hammer–jawed  throat–crushing  blind–eyed

absolutely–good–for–nothing  ball of

 

 

 

Just                                                              one.

 

 

 

You’ll tell yourself final   last   just

oh how the words lie and lay about lost

out in the garden coming in on the tide

 

You’ll tell yourself and anyone who’ll listen

since you can’t any more not even hear the

begging the screams feel the woman’s hands

 

tugging  pulling with weakness with final

ounces of  without hope but pleading none

theless  maybe you used to wonder

 

how could anyone with an iota of humanity

pull the trigger on a fourteen–year–old

child just standing there just riding by

 

but that was before they put the fear in and you                                                         stopped

wondering about anything at all stopped

questioning your motives stopped

 

watching your own actions from a close

distance and asking yourself where did your

last iota go?

 

 

 

 

Just                                                              one.

 

 

 

If only now, in this instant, you have

just

one?