one night, when the stars had burned all their fire
away and the air had turned to thick, strangling
molasses, i became curious about anatomy.
with a handful of pens—dripping ink like
butterflies stabbed through, stopped and static—
i picked apart the ghost-bodies sitting in the corners
of my room. in depression i found my heart, rotted.
in the chambers of anxiety’s unease i found my lungs.
between them both, held in the gaps between their
shaky bones, messily melding their shivering hands and
rattling cave-chests, i found shredded shards of my mind,
so darkened and charred i could hardly make them out to be
my own, remnants of something that once glowed.
the sky weighted down, the blanket of clouds shifting
into trapping echoes of iron and steel, and the desolate,
dust-buried rooms of my skull sung, littered with the
dregs of light—hungry and hollow. the night was quiet,
deeper than all the world’s caves, the roof of stars suddenly
suspended above the reach of the tallest tower. the moon
was absent, hiding from the sight of impromptu autopsy.
like amber, the air trapped the world, froze it in time—
scrambling insects stopped their struggle, gave in to
stillness. missing half my organs, i could not resuscitate
the sun.