A Butcher Knife and Pasted Wings

The knife in my chest was self inflicted.


Before the last beat of my heart I told you
there would never be another.


Shortly after my death, my corpse was caged;
kept away from eyes of disappointment, and left to ponder
the quandaries of cruelty, wallow in the past
just to escape the madness of the present.


I dreamed of you and the mechanized purgatory
that paid the bills, but cost us our identities.
Some nights, when violence filled the air, I imagined
your taste to trade one hell for another, isolation for quiet sorrow.


While you were dancing with robots,
I conversed with maniacs about the fall
of Rome and the con of the ever-shrinking
Little Debbie snack cake.


While you were pulling the wings off another factory fly,
I watched rapists walk out the door with sickness in their eyes
and minds scorching the Earth with flames of violence and sex.


The days of my death have long passed, but you still visit me
through the veil of sleep to remind me there will never be another like you
to pull my wings off and coax me over a cliff.


So now you’re the farthest you’ve ever been;
I’ve lost your smell, and your laugh is fading.
One night soon, I will make my escape with new wings grown.
I will break my promise to you, and breathe deep from the life of Mystery.


-allen masterson