Don’t laugh – you might wake her up. 

Keep it together, don’t tell her what’s the matter.

I hope you enjoy shouldering troubles alone 

because halfway through life, she can’t handle  

the pressures of being a seventeen year-old girl. 

This house is a morgue. 

We’re immune to grim things. 

And the steel tables don’t feel cold anymore. 

Nothing feels real anymore, except 

the stale jokes we use to clear 

the stale, dead air.