We the Cutters

It is Merely Flesh

Do you imagine it to hurt? Do you
imagine that blood stings like tears? In cuts
one inflicts within his own flesh, some true
crime drives guilt clean. Control is all that shuts
off the swell of anger; pain must out! Ruts
we all live in smell of graves without doors,
death a crouching craven lurks—his muts
claw at hearts bloodless; from life red blood pours

its silent tap of drums to comfort blue
souls turned black beneath the rod, and who shuts
us in our iron prisons? Why ask who
beat us down this path? Lost as those poor sluts
whose respect was ravaged as ours—our cuts
run the same invisible lines . . . It bores
self-righteous to know their sins; pious “what?”s
stain our bloodless hearts whence blood-red life pours

grey rain on all our thoughts. Joy? Love? How do
we know such things? Undeserving, we thrust
out at life as though to live, but its true
essence is back with broken—deep, clean cuts
feel more real than Oscar! Somehow it shuts
out parental voice: Worthless as the scores
of brainless, godless . . . words that brand our guts,
claw at hearts bloodied with life’s early pours

of contempt into empty vessel gluts
whose wetnurses were vipers. Why life stores
such venom, who can say? But by our cuts
we squeeze poison from pure hearts, red blood pours!