Ketchup

I think Organic tomato sauce
Is just a nice way of saying ketchup
You think using ketchup
is just a nice way to teach our kids about blood
We live in a society
that’s obsessed with smearing it on everything
And that’s what you’d wear
when we played dress up
You said
‘’you see, i’m dead you just don’t usually notice it’’
And now I
sit in a swing set made of broken branches
in a playground of caskets
Wondering how such a beautiful young girl
ends up in a place like this
Rocking myself back to comfort
I’m comfortable remembering you with a smile
But I guess we don’t want to see the truth in the corn syrup
When we watch horror movies and pretend that’s not us
We pretend we don’t know what fear means
We pretend we don’t know how shame feels
We pretend that life’s stages has age limits
and at 13 a girl only plays dress up with dresses


there are tomb stones made of dry tears here
and the wind in these parts whisper lullabies and skipping rope tunes
right now
I am sitting on a swing set made of broken branches
in a playground of caskets
wondering how we let such a lonely girl
end up in a place like this
a long nights sleepover for kids
the kind for which they don’t need
to pack a toothbrush
you wont need you pijamas
we’ll make sure you’re comfortable
in silk lining
and say we did the best we could
by surviving
we don’t want to play in this playground
but you were already at home here
by the time you were found
but I promise from now on
ill remind people,
we don’t need to use
so much god damn ketchup



Because little boys also play dress up
and it messes their head up
when you tell them that G.I joe is good
but pointing guns at people is bad
it messes them up
when you tell them to be a good father
but to be nothing like their dad
they have followed your lessons of peace
and grew up to be sent to Baghdad
and now so many end up in a place
where the breeze whispers
through the few trees
the ashes haven’t suffocated.
They’ve ended with those
who play the games they always hated
The games they were taught were out dated,
Women play housewife, men brave the fight
This fighting game is new to you
And they DARE to say they knew you,
Before you were sent to the war.
No , they didn’t.
or they wouldn’t have let you go
We’ll hide away the corn syrup and
do our best to sweep the ashes..
this playground is yours.


Then there are the little boys
who played dress up with dresses
Or the girls who thought G.I Joe meant freedom
The ones who’s gender
people only venture guesses at
They have their playgrounds too
I’ll bet you there’s one buried right next to you
You see we all end up in the same place
But It seems cemetery’s these days
are segregated
When I walk down a line and read the names
I wonder about their faces
I wonder if their father called them faggots
If their mother called them dykes
I wonder if they died happy
Knowing a lot of them hadn’t gotten their two wheelers
We’ve beaten kids
who were still riding their trikes




Tell me how do we forgive people who’s
Idea of parenting is best depicted with a fist
Tell me how we tell people
that they just cant afford to live like this

that every time they hit these children
it leaves bruises they’ll see well into their twenties
when they have walked away from their tombstones
I’m sorry for the time your parents were too stoned
To remember
they gave birth to a daughter.
And that when she shaves her head and wears leather,
I still love her.


Right now
I’m sitting on a swing set made of broken branches
In a playground of caskets
there’s silk lining somewhere down there
and I know you’re not in it.
The faggots and dykes
The depressed and the children still riding their trikes
The ones who never made it back from the war
And some of the ones who did
only to find they couldn’t live like this anymore
Those are the people
this swing set is here for.
The ones
who didn’t follow the rules when they were playing dress-up
But at least I know you,
you aren’t anywhere near it..
You’re too busy
teaching your children about ketchup