a shy boy with his ukulele

there are so many things i haven't done, so many

things that i haven't said, so many

secrets that i haven't shouted from mountains

like a love-sick fool.

 

i used to want to travel the world, i

wanted to see lovers kissing in France and a shy boy playing

his ukulele in England and girls dancing in Italy and, most of all,

i wanted to see you.

 

i wanted to tell you that i loved you, i wanted

to kiss you under the stars and smoke on an abandoned

street corner next to that shy boy playing his ukulele, i wanted

to hold you in my arms and be held in yours, i wanted

to make you smile through your tears, but now

i can't because i am slowly slipping away and you are too blind to

see, too caught up in your own world to see that mine is falling

apart.

 

there were so many things i wanted to do, so many things

i wanted to say, but now time is running out and i don't have enough left

to let you know everything that goes through my mind when i see you

and i know that you have her, i just hope that she can keep you sane

when i'm gone, i hope that

she can hold you and make you smile through your tears, i hope

she will kiss you in France, she will smoke on street corners in England, she will

make you smile through your tears.

 

i hope that she can make everything okay when i'm gone,

because you don't know this; but i'm dying darling

and i will never be able to get better, there is this monster

inside of me that is slowly, quickly, tearing me apart

and i can't fight it much longer so i'm using the last of my strength

to write you this poem and i hope that you can read

this illegible handwriting because my hand is shaking

and i'm tired and i'm dying.

 

so when i'm gone, please go to France and kiss someone under the stars

and smoke with that same someone on street corners in England by that

shy boy with his ukulele and learn how to smile through your tears, please

live the life that i never had because i know you want to travel

the world, like i once did, and please don't stay behind for me.

 

leave me some yellow roses,

for friendship,

on my gravestone and then go and travel the world and bring me back

some postcards.