Leaving New York

6: 05, Brooklyn Bridge:
 failed and tongue-tied
 body aching, hands shaking, bloody inside
 still alive.
 Sunrise like a pillar of fire,
 still running like the static on a blank channel
 sunken to the bottom of the barrel of a gun.
 braced against the railing looking straight into the sun
 like I was waiting for someone to burn a picture in my mind...
 like i could recite scripture off the lids of my eyes...
 fishing in the East River for a reason to die
 voices whispered in my mind, I believe they were mine.
 another pilgrim come to find that the bridge is a lie, and
 there's nothing on the other side...
 I was told to pick my battles. This isn't my war.
 My fight is with myself. I'm leaving New York
 Leaving my prayer rug in the apartment off Van Cortlandt
 caught in constant paranoia coughing someone's jagged hallelujah
 buildings like a burning cross, withdrawal,
 the drive north, all five burroughs fall,
 lizards listen through the walls, born into this funeral,
 news of war from city hall, subway station, FDR,
 tanks and guards, riot squad, movement of the violent mob
 I dissolve
 fall apart
 dusted in the dark, watching the war start...
 They're going to send us to the deserts of Mars,
 where we'll die or go crazy with our legs blown off
 don't want to suffocate in space
 while God and the State face off
 flags waving in the grey dawn,
 better to break north.
 I was told to pick my battles. This isn't my war.
 My fight is with myself. I'm leaving New York
 I never found solid ground
 but slept in a burning bed
 there's a couple landlords
 with a bounty on my head
 never learned to bend my neck
 or to worship the dead.
 metro card expired; hop a turnstile and then jet.
 was I a coward to abandon,
 the broken down mechanics
 that crowned Biggie Smalls as the King of Atlantis?
 "Like trees to branches, cliffs to avalanches"
 the sea in which she vanished...
 Lost Kingdom of Jay-Z and Def Jam Cannibals
 beating a dead break on the decks of the Titanic
 I am it but I can't fit.
 so when the sky fell
 I felt like one of the guilty
 with the populace in lockstep,
 ready to come and kill me.
 Did Providence demolish the buildings
 that rust and rot beneath the Hudson?
 all of it came to nothing
 and the devil's still running...
 and the devil's still running...
 I was told to pick my battles. This isn't my war.
 My fight is with myself. I'm leaving.