Apparitions

Have thoughts of the last memory pre the pandemic
Was watching you pass
In the hospice you lacked energy, eager to end it
To God you had asked with pleas for ascension
To the cosmos your mass was weak in intensive
The thought was perhaps the creed and the remnants
Of the doctrines would cast you into your prior self, the most high would help
You paid the last tithe, he gave the last rites
To lie in the grave, finally saved from that plight
That deprived because the wager that displayed on that dice
When your life, hit that shade of black ice
Because around the same time my momma's water had broke
Your cognitive was targeted for assaults by a stroke
Weren't close, since my entry was concurrent
With plenty of your hurting, now it's curtains, I'm sorry

Sitting here wrapped in regret
Trying to put these voices to rest
Hoping this moment'll pass
Conversating with the ghost of my past

How many lives alcoholism's affected?
How many died drowning sorrows in that next sip?
How many tried bouncing off for an exit
Only to get mired by doubt and the regression?
Ya, it was August of '14
That daughter of yours seen your body upward
Leaned at the wall and the door, she called 'em mournfully
All distraught as they all got to the poor scene
The procedures were given forthwith
But your features were rigor mortis
Torturous, found the liver sick with cirrhosis
So down the River Styx where ya soul went
Didn't know it, our families were dumbfound
Wish you had a chance to glance at your son now
Be grand seeing all the man he's become now
All the standards, he's outran 'em and trumped now
You'd be dumb proud, so the tears they come down
Remember your voice, but it fades in the grieving
Your disease, a generation bequeathed it
Wish we all got you the aid that you needed, I'm sorry

Sitting here wrapped in regret
Trying to put these voices to rest
Hoping this moment'll pass
Conversating with the ghost of my past

Each death, a shard of innocence fades
Mnemonic for how far we are from simplest days
Feels tectonic how hard they've been shifting my plate
And what's on it, enlarging, proliferating the weight
On my shoulder blades, as reality bites
I'm 28 and my salary's height
Has just passed, the minimum wage
Can't cut slack putting ambition to waste
At 25 and 20 it was glimmers of faith
I identify I'm empty in a cynical place
Can't minimize the envy in my sentiment's traits
My innards tied it lends me to a pitiful phase
My visual's dazed, who I'm losing believed in me most
So I'm easily host to a load of regrets
And I mope since I'm yet to be achieving these goals
And I'm reaching 3-0, so
This mix of choices just led to shit employment
Feel like a disappointment
Hard to smile, can't reconcile
Some saw death without
Seeing my success, if I let you down, I'm sorry

Sitting here wrapped in regret
Trying to put these voices to rest
Hoping this moment'll pass
Conversating with the ghost of my past