She breaks plates over my head,
and haunts me in my dreams.
I used to love her,
especially when she’d scream.
That might as well have been
on the moon at this point,
so far away and anemically pale—
a body lost to a funeral at sea.
So when we sit around the fire,
and pass around the bottle,
and tell each other how
we got the scars on our faces,
I’ll take the drink and smile,
because that story’s just for me.
When I catch a glimpse
out of the corner of my eye,
of a man made of metal
and circuitry racing by,
I have to rush to the hospital,
my eyes fill up with red.
My arteries burst open,
the monster rising from the dead.
So when we sit around the fire,
and pass around the bottle,
and tell each other how
many bones we have broken,
I’ll take the drink and smile,
because that story’s just for me.
There are things in life you want
but you know you cannot have,
that make you run at night,
hoping the feeling will pass.
Scents that confuse you
as to where you are,
so you cut the red wire,
and fall through the trap door.
So that when we sit around the fire,
and pass around the bottle,
and tell each other how
we got all these burns,
you’ll take the drink and smile,
because that story’s just for you.
© 2016