My limbs pinned and flayed.
A curious crowd of men hover overhead,

Floating faces bobbing closely
Like great bearded balloons.

In a flash of white and sharply gleaming silver,
They swiftly strip my leather skin

And, upon prying the cage, are astounded to have found
Only a cavity in the place a heart should be.

Throughout my warren of vein sits the last true proof
That anything once flowed there—

A thickly pickled ichor to make sickened
Wives’ stomachs turn at their evening roast.