I keep my sickness polished.
Comb my hair back with ***** hands.
Stand straight in church-basement light
trying not to grin like an animal.
There’s something wrong in me.
Something humid.
Something that opens its mouth
whenever the room goes quiet.
I like the smell of ruined things.
Basements. Wet fabric.
Perfumme mixed with hospital air.
The sweet copper warmth underneath apologies.
It is deranged.
Vile little habits stitched behind the teeth.
The kind you hide like bruises under black sleeves.
My shame is never clean.
It sweats.
It lingers in the throat.
I watch myself rot in reflections.
Eyes too bright.
Mouth twitching at all the wrong moments.
Half disgusted. Half starving.
There’s excitement in corruption.
The body leaning closer
while the mind recoils like burnt skin.
Every craving arrives dresed as punishment.
Every punishment comes back wanting more.
I’ve touched loneliness so long
it feels intimate now.
Like a fevered thing sleeping beside me
with its ribs showing through pale skin.
People sense it now.
That damaged appetite.
That faint cemetery smell beneath conversation.
They step back slowly.
Like they’ve seen blood in my mouth.
Still, I keep speaking softly.
Keep smiling politely.
Keep all the perverted little hungers
buttoned inside the suit.
Like insects in a reliquary.
Like maggots sealed in silver.
Alive.
Still moving.