Skinned
My mother never knew what
To do when I walked from
The step of her door towards
A world without her.
She had finished, then.
Or at least she had made it
As far as she had ever thought to.
She rested. She deserved more.
But less she found,
In her heart,
In her stomach,
Something was boiling.
A black and viscous sap,
Pure aestheticism and sickly rock
Ground and stewed until
A tar had formed in her chest.
Something was no longer there.
She could no longer protect her child,
Who was no longer her child.
And the act of protection,
It had left her unprotected.
And in her rest,
All she found was unrest.
I walked down the open road.
Smoke clogged my lungs
And dust filled my sight.
But there, on the road
I saw a rotten thing.
A dog—no, hardly a dog—
It was mange and flesh
Held together by bones
Like sticks, stuck.
It looked up at me
It looked and bayed,
Begging to be fed
Begging to be dead.
For the poor thing
It hadn't a goal
Not even surviving had
Gripped its heart.
All it saw was fogged
And all it knew was
Rotting in its disuse.
