The End of My Friends

[TranquillityBase]

A cold body hits the earthen floor,
after it sings its final hymn,
one of death and pleasure and pain
as the poison invades the veins.

He was just twenty-two
and starting anew,
escaping from the crosshairs of life
that had already greeted him before
As a child he had been wounded              At least for me, comparing abuse to a gun doesn't work too well; guns don't produce the slow death that abuse does, in my mind
by the same gun
that was about to bring him to his grave,
the gun named
Abuse
which had left a scar
that twisted around his heart
and this time to flee from the strain
he plunged an object into his skin
as he played the game
that you play to go numb.
He had only begun
to live
but he had no chance at all.
The heartache had found him early.
So had the alcohol.
He was still a boy
and he only wanted to be loved.
November 13th, 2016.

Five years prior,
a young blonde girl of only sixteen
was found in her home
a victim of her shattered heart
tearing itself in two
and in the process
she had consumed
what she felt was her remedy
that would end swiftly
the night that had accompanied her for so long.
She hadn't even begun
to live
and even though she was strong
she couldn't hold on
after she too
had been wounded by the gun named Abuse
or so she had told one of her best friends        This line puts most of the previous lines about her in doubt
She was still a girl
and she only wanted to be loved.
November 10th, 2011

Now twenty-six,     This stanza is where I finally engaged with your poem.  I think it would improve the poem to be briefer with the introductory stanzas about your lost friends
a young woman replays
what her youthful heart had taken in
and gone are the days
where she can relax and say
that everything will be alright.
Instead,                                       Really excellent stanza here
in panic,
she holds her place
near a luminescent box
and counts up the minutes
the hours,
and the days
which multiply in agonizing length
until her best friend and her lover
appears yet again,
his words penetrating
the breadth of the void
and the breadth of her anxiety
which are so real
for she has seen
what suffering can bring,
the effects
of the venom that carry
one out of misery
even though it stings
and the aftertaste of the clear but pungent liquid
that pervades the body
and the soul
and she has encompassed her thoughts
around other cherished spirits
who have fallen.

This is why she has sworn to be there for him   This might be another poem.  I see the connection to the previous stanzas, but it took too long to get here.
even if he does not understand why
because she knows of the hobby that he partakes in,
in his spare time
and it devours her mind
the way a lion devours the carcass
of an expired beast
for she is not just a girl anymore
and the realness of reality
has made her into a woman
who fears the finality
of a man that has captivated her being
and should his final breath
be wasted in such a way
she'd cut her heart out of her chest
and place on his grave
and there it would stay
until the end of her days
as she wasted away
and met her bitter and unending fate
in the depths of Hades
as the flames rose higher and higher.

Two birthdays,
ruined by the heavy weight of night,
two friends gone
with the fading of the light,
and a solemn chill
brought about
as candles
mark the end of an era.
November 19th, 2011
November 19th, 2016

To my lover,
I refuse to let there be another
because while you are a man,
I can see that you only want to be loved
and three sets of candles would signify
the fires of hell.

Never again.

The blue lines are my favorites.  I'd suggest deleting the dates.  I don't think they will mean anything to a reader.  A couple of other notes up above.