maybe me

i read the epitaph:
    it said,"a jack, with a beer back
    a pack of squares, and I'm
    all in on the last laugh."
i could tell by the rhyme without reason
that this was in fact a treasonous math.
    something about this unnamed weight of familiarity
    soothed and scared me.
      it haunted yet housed a thousand verses not yet slung.
      hung heavy, and stingy like the murderous burden
         of a worker bee turned surgeon.
surely this polished turd of a tombstone, left forgotten
beyond the borders of the foraged corners, spoke
as a triumph of absurdity and humor, or perhaps just as a warning.
     had i not learned to respond to recognition, regardless
         of how hard the logic can be marketed,
     then i wouldn't be pinned,as the target of this smartass's
          last remarks.
hardened as a tart pastry,
the taste parked itself firmly
in a sort of precognitive memory.
jogged yet discharged honorably,
and in a moment of disparaging honesty,
i surmised the momento and its probability.
lubricated well enough to absorb the shock
of the situation,
i raise a flask full of masked ambition,
and wishing well tempered,
make light of the stormy weather...