Haunted

Bite off your tongue, spit out the blood & say something more than any word ever could.

Seal the wound with white-hot metal & stuff with wire wool, stifle a scream & feel a weak edge where laughter descends into desperation or cruelty;

ignore

the words that form & try to force open your mouth.

Let no sound out.

& in silence find the patience to discover an unspoken secret; the obscene foundation of everything keeping us safe from what awaits within.

Waits like a swallowed stone to kill or be expelled from these bodies haunted by language:

a ritual sacrifice; necessary price to be paid, ridiculous offering made to satiate the infinite & the horror it brings…

Open your mouth, let it all out: without a tongue all sounds are one.