The Probable Causes Of My Demise

By Edgar Allan Poe

Buried alive through misadventure

Buried alive through devious intent (by a mortal enemy)

Sleep deprivation induced by stifling nightmares of live interment

Being –- not buried, but — enclosed, restricted or encased, in a confined area until suffocated or starved over a long period of time

Same as above, but possibly sooner if a sharpened pendulum be incorporated

Alcoholism

What I Found In My Pocket This Morning

By Charles Bukowski

An empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s

Blood

Jizz

Blood (someone else’s)

The memory of a life not lived

Herpes-riddled chapstick

My Good Friends And What I Think Of Them

By Ernest Hemingway

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Lazy Drunk

Gertrude Stein: Lazy Dyke

John Dos Passos: Overrated treacherous hack

Ford Maddox Ford: Pompous, wheezing dilettante

James Joyce: Considering he’s an Irish, emaciated, nearly blind bookworm, he can string together some decent prose.

Harold Loeb: Jew

What I Did Today And The Thoughts That Followed

By Nathaniel Hawthorne

Cooked up some eggs — Judging others is wrong

Mailed letter to Melville — It is a sin to impugn evil to another

Lightly dusted my bookshelf — Witch-hunts are bad

Attended a comedic performance — We are all sinners

Ate pot roast for dinner — I must endeavor not to believe myself holier than thou

Readied myself for bed — Christ, I don’t remember that demon postmaster stamping my letter!

What To Do If You Are Confronted With An Absurd And Impossibly Cruel Fate

By Franz Kafka

Rail against it pointlessly

Accept it inconceivably