beat into me until i'm broken and the feelings
alight the layer of skin just below the outermost,
like the lining of a jacket, catching aflame.

scratch out the remaining worries with the spines of your teeth.
rake me upwards, shred the doubts like old sunburn peel, and peel and peel the layers of mistrust off of me till i'm raw, pink and ready.

never has this body not been scarred
without first feeling excitement.

since you pierced it, now you're responsible. I'll chase that ownership, mutually owed, to the end of all meaning. till the sensations are the only bits that still make sense, and then you can make up for everything else.

only after this, after everything else is spread across a blood splattered floor, can things start again. only once you make up for not returning the parts of me. only once my remaining organs, now calcified, have been cracked to their inner ichor, and you tip me gently into your thankless lungs.

only once the prostration, the words left since butchered into me, have been flayed by your regret, and raised to the height of saints.

hang me up.
swing by my legs and wrap around the root of me like you once would.
debase yourself inside of me again, learn to build something again. dig deeper than needed again, strike copper in my veins so I can oxidise again. watch me alight again, at your briefest touch.