ever heard about the therapist who murdered the depressed?
says his grief sharp as a blade continued into the bottom end

loudly, loudly, ever so loudly… the tinny-sound of a bell, yunno,
is inhumane, the jarring of grief & snap-snaps into dawn could

have you lip-taped with red songs or— a rush of welcoming hands.
& of course, anything with teeth is a blade. anything with fingers

has pines or nettles or awls or saws. a blade tore into the minds of the
wolves & wore them inside out. grief has never been the enemy

it is humans who nurture flowers with blade hands. blade people
with blade reason, blade faces with blade tongues. blade feelings for

blade liberality in a blade world. I love blades. how they cut away from
your body, make sure no body parts are in the cutting path or interfere

with it. the subtlety of flesh-tearing, the grand opinion it holds, unfazed.
a blade’s last urgency is not blood, but dust. each skin an algorithm for

earth’s final bed. what shatters from a blade still is blade. what ruins & sharpens
it. what rusts & unrusts. what leaves us throttled is not what is done

but what stays in the doing. nights with claws, days shackled in teeth.
what do we have to live for when the end is coming with thistles?

Aremu Adams Adebisi was nominated for Best of the Net, Pushcart Prize, and Fringe Play Festival in 2019. He has work published in Storyscape, RIGOROUS, Rockvale Review, Newfound, Third Wednesday, and elsewhere. He serves as an editor for ARTmsoterrific as well as a panelist for the Gloria Anzaldua Poetry Prize. He tweets @aremudamsbisi.