Pals For Life

We carved our names in the shadows of the street,

Two ghosts in the alleys where the lost ones meet.

Thought we were kings of a kingdom built on fear,

Never heard the warnings screaming in our ears.

We said “ride or die,” like it meant something real,

But every lie we told was another soul to steal.

Pals for life, that’s what we swore in the night,

But the bars came down and exposed every lie.

You took your last breath in a cold concrete cell,

Now I’m left alone with the truth I can’t quell.

Pals for life… but life don’t last in hell.

We laughed at the law, thought we’d never get caught,

Blind to the wreckage our choices had wrought.

You cracked first — the guilt ate you alive,

Prison walls echo when a conscience finally cries.

You said “brother, I’m done, I can’t outrun my sins,”

And the silence that followed was louder than sirens.

Pals for life, that’s what we swore in the night,

But the bars came down and exposed every lie.

You took your last breath in a cold concrete cell,

Now I’m left alone with the truth I can’t quell.

Pals for life… but life don’t last in hell.

No glory in the stories we used to brag about,

Just faces in the dark I can’t erase or drown out.

Your death was the verdict neither judge nor jury gave —

A final sentence carved on an unmarked grave.

We weren’t legends —

We were warnings.

We weren’t brothers —

Just a pair of broken warnings.

Pals for life, but the oath was a lie,

Built on the backs of the ones we denied.

Now I walk free, but I’m chained to the past,

Your ghost in my ear saying nothing ever lasts.

Pals for life… and death came fast.