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SLAB

By Kirsty Mealing



Flesh on the slab

There's something bout the steel

That makes her pale look drab

The way the curls fall

Undisturbed

By breath or words

Makes me feel sad.

I almost thought she had

More bones than that,

More spines intact

“She was pretty”.

It dribbles out my mouth

Like an idle ditty

There's static in my eyes

And my brain feels gritty

“A pity

You see that,

D’you say it

When she was

Living?”

They're giving

Their gloves a

Plasma coating

As they go in:

Insides oblige

As silicone

Clacks with absence.

A ghost town

Where perhaps,

Consumed by better,

I'd plagued-out the good

With rotten wood

To build this house.

Now, too late, I see

How her bags barely carry

Her baggage,

They dip softly.

She doesn't bulge,

She undulates like loving sighs.

There's no colour

And yet her skin mourns not

But sings:

If only peace wasn't earned this way.


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