If I told them everything, I think the birds
would tut, sympathy coating every titter, claiming that the world would be better
off had I succeeded the first, the second, the eleventh time I tried
To rid this monster of its next second — its reflection
in a noose, its remembrance painted in a yellow CAUTION tape begging
“Active Scene of Crime Keep Out Keep Out Keep —”
claiming Body boundaries already erased, the carcass hidden as to avoid
The communal pick-up that condemns while it sheds
lamentations for the heartbreak the flock nests in
to ensure inevitability.
We are not a long-lived species, see;
The woman unnamed cries so prettily on the screen, before
Painting the mean floor crimson with
all the Parts yet untouched. The silver villain screams
vengeance, spends years imploring the fresh Flesh to forget
In metamorphosis, ressusciter
Until the final moment, wherein arrives the All-Knowing
Hero, parroting the bills of another, and his best line
“You’re Damaged Goods”
And down goes the Wicked Witch and his Tongue, the Frankenstein of
shock value stillborn before convalescence.
There is a such a thing, the gentle Heroes Know, as a creature
too broken for them to bother, no matter how much
you broker for recovery —
“Oh, you
Poor thing, How old
were you the first
time?”
Becoming “How can
you tell that it’s you, and not
the blooming red, the hands
between the legs, the desire to reshape
an amalgamation ablation
into something forgiven, forgivable?”
I become the god of my own lines, the poet of
Physicality, I bury the bleeding bird and
the bruises, the burden
The mirror is guest to a host of practice, every
muscle twitch a prayer, every fumbling furrow another attempt
At molding a molting of something
no longer human —
What is this Body that has endured and what
Is this thing that now inhabits it?
In lack of flight, we build wisdom of rebirth
Searching for answers disconnected
Calling up lines to phones never answered
Though the questions ring and ring and ring
In spite of an existence otherwise considered extinguishable
Junpei Tarashi is a currently a junior undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University, studying molecular and cellular biology and chemistry. In the spare time not spent poring over textbooks, they serve as the Editor-in-Chief to the Agapanthus Collective. Their most recent works have appeared in Pages Penned in Pandemic, Chambers, and After Happy Hour Review.
Burnt Pine 