The hands that are locked inside my body
pull at my ribcage. We'll make you an angel,
they say, but that means
tearing my flesh apart. I beg them –
please, take my brain,
pull it and mould it and set it on fire.
The brain is too precious, they spit,
and I want to die. I want to die
to make myself something else. Something...
palatable. Something that I can chew
and swallow all at once.

Instead, they bite. God, they sink
their seraphim teeth into the flesh
that I call myself. And they digest.

And what of the brain?
Alive, immobile, it waits.
In pain, it waits. Screams.
Begs for release.
But these angels are not from Heaven,
nor do they caress broken bones
once they have devoured.