Do Not Offer Platitudes

Do not offer platitudes
I know: 'he's in a better place.'
Do not teach me 'gospel truths,'
I've heard each one a thousand times.

Do not simply smile and run,
while hiding from your fear,
as if my tears were poisonous
or untimely death contagious.

Don't compound my aching pain
by turning from my lonely grief;
our friendship means so much to me,
do not kill it with your haste.

Please listen as I speak my pains
Or simply hold me when my tears alone
come crashing through. I simply ask:
stay by me now; we walk through thin.