After listening to Mad Season and reading a Wikipedia article about Layne's addiction and death, I was inspired to write this:

ADDICT DOWN

“My pain is self chosen…”

Words oozing from headphones,
The harbinger of a man-made hell
Created by the wasted talent
With a two-teeth grin
And sugar white skin,
An 80 pound shell of former glories
Lying on a shit-stained mattress
In a speedball night.
He’s made himself his own prisoner
In his sludge factory,
The exile he calls home,
Drifting in and out of a coma sleep
Amongst the vomit and syringes.
Once the voice of many, now a
Slave to the needle,
Strangled by the dope sick,
Lacking feeling,
Smack sucking him dry.
Amongst the deadening silence,
Former friends walk by,
Barely speaking,
Throwing rocks at an empty skull
Trying to awaken
Innocence drowned,
An addict down
Calling mayday.
A hero falling into the ground.

“…the only direction to go is down.”

well done but sad...as it should be....as I read it I hear the music for Get Born Again....