FREE VERSE

Disintegration

Below the sheen

photo of author by author

Disintegration

Underneath the surface
just below the sheen
there is ruin
there is rot

Dead skin, fingernails
nose hair toe jam

Dust bunny tumbleweeds
of eyelash and dandruff

Hubble-barns of shavings
a metric ton of farts

oceans of urine
blood, semen, snot

wilderness of microbes
pathogens, and germs

universe of unswept debris

Pieces of us fall away
the pretty things
that matter —
our bodies in decay

Every moment
in decline
every day
older, greyer

All else is fine
but it’s fiction, innit?
alternate histories
of who we never are
or never were

not quite