a field of grass
in flames…
the commercial
for aspirin
promises relief
Cigarette burns in his shirt, the flaws of habit. Beard and hair unkempt, he doesn’t look in the mirror anymore. Empty pizza boxes litter the apartment. Scraps of food on the floor feed the roaches. There’s a mound of molding clothes in the middle of the bedroom floor, and he hasn’t changed the sheets in months, hasn’t drawn the curtains in years.
One picture on the wall: a radiant face—locked for all time behind a thin pane of glass—stares at him in silence. He kisses the glass, then crawls into bed, fully dressed. It’s the same dream each night, a dance with her in the moonlight, ending with a car crash. Shaken awake, he reaches for a cigarette, the flicker of a match in the darkness the only light he has left.
a fly
in the spider’s web…
the queen
at the guillotine
asks for a painkiller