Tread Lightly

Deal me a shit hand,
and I'll become a gambling man,
shattering glass with gas masks,
daring you to mock big boy pants,
leaving you wheezing in the RV,
face-planting into a tree.
I'll feed you a sandwich,
cutting the crust
until you've had enough.

I'll break bacon
on my birthday,
and fly from the sky
like an abandoned glass eye.

When I tell you to run,
it's not a warning.
No, you'll never
see it coming.

I keep enemies close,
so when you come crashing
against the sanctity of family,
you'll have to go.

I've been through the desert
on a horse with no name,
and it's a shame
I didn't stick its
head in your bed.

Yes, Ted,
we'll talk like men.

Go ahead
and push planchettes
at a pencil sketch.
I'll avoid the blinding
blade of your axe attack,
sing in the shower,
all the while you invade
my own private domicile.

You'll become another
box cutter bleed out,
a short order cook
with no splash,
boiled to bone in a barrel,
dissolved in a vat
like the aftermath
of 6353 Juan Tabo.

I'll pour in your throat
what you don't want—
a world without
Classic Coke.

I'll Jesse James a train
while you bathe
in acid, present

a chance for revenge,
the old-school cartel
ringing the bell for help,
taking your face off,
exposing your sockets.

Ding. Ding. Ding.

That's right.
The Learn'd Astronomer's
a nursing home bomber.

I'm the one who knock,
and I've got rot,
the danger ripping off
my empire's recipe,
Crystal Blue Persuasion.

I'll cover the legacy costs
with cell block
shanks pulling rank,
eliminating evidence
with magnets,
sinking sin in ricin.

Down by the River,
I'll leave no witness.

My remission's
on a mission,
but I left
Leaves of Grass
on the toilet tank
for Hank.

When a rat
springs the trap,
dropping dimes
in the desert
with my Benjamins,
and revenge rests
in my rib cage,

I won't say
I'm sorry, Mr. Jackson.
I stood at your bedside
and watched your wretched
girlfriend Jane die.
I won't apologize
a trillion times.

Hit the Road, Jack.

When there's too many
lilies in the valley,
and I'm twisting
in tattered tequila,
shattering your Gray Matter,
we won't reminisce over ramen.

Just remember,
when I'm coughing up blood,
that's karma's carbon
in your comeuppance.

Yeah, science.

"If you don't know who I am,
then maybe your best course
would be to tread lightly."
— Walter White, aka Heisenberg,
Breaking Bad, Season 5, Episode 9.

This poem contains lyrics from "A Horse with No Name" by America. "Crystal Blue Persuasion," "Down by the River," and "Hit the Road, Jack" are song titles. Leaves of Grass and "The Learn'd Astronomer" are written works by Walt Whitman, as featured in Breaking Bad.

This poem was originally published in Write Under the Moon on Medium.