Fools for Supper

Cold fist carnivals. Red drapes awash in vomit. There they laid; two beetles on their backs. The force of their own struggling spinning them.

The first swing is only to test their pitch. A decoy.

Sheets not to dread what's done. Or has been. Chokes the wrinkle down her spine. As the pleasure collapses under her weight.

He draws the map while inside her, but never goes there.

Sour apple sex. Instead of picking ripe fruit. Gathering what's already fallen. It clutched that branch to its last breath, but the branch had long ago decided to let go of it.

The stale remains. Absent-minded binders browse their past. With ink embedded too deep.

Throw it away.

Fool the closet into thinking it's empty again. That those cobwebs cling now to corners only. No pertinent typefaces. No hand-written edits.

Slide the door. Chase the drapes. As the terrace swallows the sunset. Coax the venom out of duplicitous blood. Fly the stairs. Young again. But still older than was hoped. Not what's put into it.

What's uncovered.

And still he keeps looking at what he refuses to see.

The motionless headboard. The shadows unchanging as they dig. Pillows discarded. Blank sheets.

And still he keeps searching the hole, though he knows it's always been empty.