Slippery
Stitching severed veins is messy work
They slip like clever worms from clumsy thumbs
Coating sanguine every surface that while fleeing flop upon
They are pushed by metered measure
Preprogrammed with desperate pressure
Meeting only free and empty air
Cardiac care gone wrong without such bodily resistance
I must anticipate these wild unwieldy worms
With insistence-soaked and trembling well-trained hands I try
Gotcha!
To spite my sinking lids and draining brain
I will work quick to fight the scheming dreamy fog
Poke, pain, stitch, pull, poke, pain, stitch, pull
To put these messy worms quite back to work
I stop this leak in service of a bloody life alive
I will clean the wound
And numb the pain
Tomorrow
-a.r.
Painting: The Bleeding Abstract by Adrianna Majewski
Visceral. Pure poetry.
Thank you. Yes, literally visceral. Some days life feels like those slippery severed veins. I commiserate with your mentioned weariness that you wrote about with your recent (re)post. I too am feeling that today. Those slippery worms could have easily been labeled nerves, as veins. Here’s to some rest, mental and physical.
You conveyed it brilliantly.