We are still of use though the gash smells sour,
amethyst rot. We’re twitching devices —

sanded bones and stitches. The worms devour
all that the obsidian knife slices:

meaty scads and sheaves of skin. This butcher’s
love of gristle, of grotesqueness, of boils

that one picks at when they wish the blisters
to burst. The mirror knows how darkness spoils

when cast from its surface. We are of use
because we dream. The stone scalpel cannot.

The hand behind it won’t. Dreams of clabber.
Dreams of grubs in the lesion. We seduce

all that the suture holds dear: curdle, clot,
congeal. Dreams of May rot. Dreams of canker.