Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war

Do nothing to stem the flow of blood

From veins to ****** floor

Your temperance be ******, you fool

You think that simple platitudes will save you?

The sword will brave your utterances and incantations

Speculations on how best to carve up thine wrists

Will spare you the rod of another man’s hands

And throw light upon the thought ways

Of the creatures whose bones sit picked clean around you

Cry ******

Cry foul play

Just cry out the rivulets burning holes into your cheekbones

Slicing through ash and the program of fear

Written into your features

As you sit in sullen contemplation

Of how this might end for you

The flickers of fickle light exposing dirt under your fingernails

Cuticles pared back to ****** knuckles

Honeysuckles feeding from the filthy dripping faucet on the corner

Brilliance turned to grey and muted brown

And down beneath the soldier’s feet they fall

Their roots frozen into concrete as yours are

You shall not venture this way again

You shall not move from this moment

Where time stopped

And words failed