“Space Scissors”

“Space Scissors”

I walk through a land of broken teeth

pulled pullovers, snowy driveways

through broken bones

where every memory is chilled

and crammed in a locket round

the five o’clock shadow hordes

wringing my neck and number,

galloping with bright lights,

rose and red bouquets, princesses dying,

blue flowers pressed to lips,

spiders in hourglasses,

axes greeting spark plugs

greased hands, the witch’s lies

the ogre’s children

if only for human flesh boots

and blades for

ballerinas to dance knives on

while we fence in a moat drowned

in this your life

of your sweet heart of stone

seasoned with scissors, scalpels

and lashes for beehives too quick

behind the refrigerator

your body disappears.

Tags: Nicholaus Patnaude, poem, poetry, space scissors