Cannibalize (Poem)

What can remain when fortuity fair

pays back the villain?

The fleeting footsteps of providence,

a hasty retreat.

What is there left behind to grieve,

to mourn,

this death in life,

except to eat one's own heart out,

but unironically.

Your decadence,

a sly smile racked,

like a body broken,

from ear to ear,

a banal lottery,

an empty gamble made by a rabid creature,

all foam and fangs.

You took your poetic license,

spitting verses,

like a drunk clearing his throat.

Have you looked in the glass's reflection?

Have you seen your unabridged silhouette,

your twins entire,

the duality of lies like your sorry pick up lines and desperately cut white lines,

you once cut,

cut,

cut,

like stripes I once cut,

cut,

cut.

Did we never believe we butchers would have to pay a cost for all that carving,

whether into ourselves,

or the mirror's reflection?

Still you think you can sculpt a goddess with scarlet smiles,

smearing red on the lips of old statues in your sleep,

you,

a Medusa in inverse,

an Adonis making stone of woman,

but like a world upside down,

she hardens when he looks away.

Safe,

you believe,

in the oubliette of your pandered reality,

a bubble blown,

like a child,

in which you think you see your past dancing.

And you did dance, didn't you?

In a town you incorporated Love,

but the locals call Desperation.

You own a three legged dog.

But you keep calling her by different names.

Her rib cage is showing.

This is what is left?

But what is right?

bvk, 2021.