Pictures in the News

I’m the one who has to strip the bandages off your hands.
I don’t understand how they can still from a fist
when they have been split for so long.

Another temporary layer of skin peels off them,
a new one will grow in it's place,
every sharp white scar still intact.

The bandages won't stick
but they never do, do they?
When I pull them off,
strands of glue come with them
and I’m startled by their stalwart adherence.

Every useless strip of glue is a new crime,
New wars starts in the places where old ones ended.
You tell me you find the symmetry exciting
but that doesn’t stop it from staining the sink.

The wrapping always leaves tight red lines on your palms,
and you will always use them as a guide in the future;
when your fingernails have grown out
and your hair is back to it's natural color,
and the pretty boy wearing the skinny tie doesn't notice you.

The lines point accusingly towards the world around you
like pictures in the news.
They draw an arrow from your fingers to my lips;
a love connection,
and barely breathing, I whisper:





"The next time you do this,
if it doesn't kill you, it will kill me."