A

Life

Among

Cannibals

 

i

 

They are legion.

Their just desserts

nothing less than

the pure at heart.

 

Infused by dissatisfaction,

barely at one

with their beliefs

they are passive aggressive.

Some with no capacity for joy.

Not to mention

the occasional consummate flake.

All are ouroboros;

swallowing their own tales

yet unable to

render what they want

from each other.

ii 

 

My story is apocryphal.

Having found

the calcification of I

a personal travesty,

I descended into darkest Apatha,

a missionary hoping to cleanse

my thinking by curating

superfluous thoughts.

 

Not so much quieting the mind

but mastering the silence

so as not to fall prey to distraction.

I constructed my days out of

the world’s predilection for

unceasing rejuvenation,

the detritus of which is

ever present for the taking.

 

Make no mistake,

there’s no poetry

in being devoured.

 

Look closely.

In every photo

the same face.

Always a show

of gnashing teeth.

Taking information in

with or without nuance,

reducing everything 

to pure sustenance.

They like their

picture taken,

craving proof

of their own existence;

without need for beliefs,

a life reduced to

only documentation.

My mistake was in wanting

to be palatable, appealing,

which only increased

their appetites

even while I feared

being eaten.

Then again, 

I am their smorgasbord.

iii

I blame myself.

My imagination is muscular;

strong, sleek, supple,

the very incarnation of nutrition.

They talk of beauty,

theirs and others

as if all were items

on a fast-food menu.

 

They will not be disregarded,

nor stand silently by.

They grapple for attention,

hijacking any conversation,

setting traps, baiting,

tipping every room

towards themselves.

Manic, over-active, acting out,

they gather their victims

to brazenly procure,

unable to help themselves.

Consuming everything

by gulping it down

then spitting out the bones.

They are always hungry.

 

With everything on the table,

who needs a place setting

seeing as they could just as easily

feed on each other?

02/20/24