My father was moonstruck at a young age, and though he had a very whimsical soul, he also had great, almost psychic, intuition; in his handwritten journal he foretold the arrival of a dastardly entity at his club, the Comedy Fortress, who would be filled with both a nefariously melancholy demeanor and perversely righteous indignation.

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© 2023 - dustygrein

(Thank you for a great little challenge. Sometimes I create these little random word challenges in poetry, but occasionally I try and see if I can do it all in one sentence... this one worked pretty well.)

this barbed wire earth

that claimed my

sanguine heart

and married tears

to concrete

grow the most

beautiful

flowers

how desolate

the frayed landscapes

of wounds

that adorn

flesh in ochre, crimson

blushed, bitten

a fleeting confection

A ghost dressed is stars

and spines

splayed in reverence

trailed snakeskin

in the garden, an altar

When someone puts a loaded gun in their mouth and pulls the trigger, the human head opens up like a flower. This flower formation can happen from GSWs to knee-caps and even the groin area, but nothing compares to the head. It’s utterly horrifying to see, but maybe by the time you’re done reading this, you’ll see just how beautifully poetic it can be.

The only reason I know all of this is because I am so privileged to once have had an almost promising career in the medical field, and I was going to eventually specialize in Forensic Pathology after becoming a general surgeon. Fourteen years of schooling sounded like a fucking dream to the nerd I’ve always been. I was the youngest-ever candidate chosen for an exclusive summer program at University Medical when I saw my first and only self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. And just like myself, this person applied and was approved for Full Body Donation—so I was free to do hands-on study of his remains (thank you for your service, Sir).

The first requirements you need for that line of work is a strong stomach and an eager love for the science. However, to keep you there requires a genuine desire to help others. I am an advocate at heart, and the crux of what a pathologist does is give a voice to the voiceless. I’ve always been determined to leave this world in better shape than it was given to me, and this was my way of helping people. Studying those precious former lives under the most phenomenal doctors was by far the best professional experience of my life.

So, of the dozens of autopsies I have taken part in (both in person and through video/photo lecture), one of them, sadly, was this suicide I mentioned. He was a middle-aged male and the cause of death was a self-inflicted gunshot into the mouth. It’s not the only suicide I worked on, but definitely the most visually memorable. The pressure a gunshot creates inside this air-tight, fluid-filled compression chamber we carry on our necks forces a human head to open up like the fully-bloomed petals of a lily. Any remaining teeth become forged with pieces of skull and brain because the force and heat of the explosion literally turns any hard matter into the shrapnel of a pressure cooker bomb. Ever observant as I was, they allowed me to remove a tooth I identified that was lodged into one of the petals of the human head flower.

Unfortunately, I never even made it to medical school because life threw too many punches at me at that time [*ba-dum-tee* formerly-abused humor anyone? Eh? Ehh?]. Just joking! I’ve always said, “If I couldn’t laugh at my life, I would’ve fucking killed myself a long ass time ago.” But aside from comedy saving my soul countless times, that suicide case is seared into my amygdala—from the sorrow and duty I felt toward this man and his family, down to the smell of his chewing tobacco still stuck to portions of his gums. Clearly enough to give anyone reservations about that second of bravery it takes to just fucking do it.

This was the case which also piqued my interest in the funeral business. Any Funeral Director/Embalming Specialist who can put that train wreck back together to resemble anything of the man his family and friends love so dearly, oof... to me, that is art of the highest caliber. Only the most skilled specialists in the world can pull that off well. Most families will opt for a closed casket in these cases, and you don’t get a “body funeral” if you’re signed up for Full Body Donation—but I wanted to be the one-of-a-kind talent who not only performed autopsies to the utmost perfection, but could give families their beloved back, looking beautiful, one last time.

Death wasn’t just my calling to help the world… Death was my life’s passion. I might still have a chance at the funeral business someday—that is, if it’s not me who ends up on that cold, stainless steel examination table first. Death has reappeared in my life, in a bad way, and that fucker is lurking ever closer, each day.

The majority of my physical and emotional scars belong to a single bad man who I will soon introduce y’all to in my darkest tale of woe. This man is solely responsible for the loss of my ability to continue my education and accomplish these dreams I once had. I had to plan nonstop for my escape because he was so cunning. And one day, the plan finally fell perfectly into place because he’d given himself a little too much heroin. He was completely zonked out and nodding off so heavily that I simply walked right out the front door. I told him I was off to send a gift to his mom, which he easily took me up on since he’d forgotten her birthday. He let go of my shirt and I slipped away. I escaped nearly 20 years ago, and to this day, he still finds ways to contact me online.

As long as this bad man stays away, I wish him no harm. But the videos he’s been sending me lately are what struck my desire to start writing again. Not only do I need to finally heal this pain once and for all, but I need to document what he did to me (just in case):

1) My beautiful body, gone.

2) My beautiful mind, gone.

3) My beautiful career, gone.

4) My beautiful life, FUCKING GONE.

This bad man has delusions that I will always be his property. I truly feel sorry for him, but I can never forget what he stole from me. How could I? His torture is all over my naked body every time I look in the mirror. The stalking and obsession seems to be growing, and because he was so smart, I can never call the cops on him again (long story).

So, my only choice was to finally agree to have a gun in our home full-time (specifically, when Mister is gone). Thanks to the Traumatic Brain Injury from this bad man, I’ve been a nervous, stuttering klutz ever since—so not only did it kill my once surgeon-steady hands and ballerina grace, naturally, I was always scared to be responsible for my own gun. However, I have too many lives depending on me now. She’s no Colt .45 with a pearl grip, but she’s definitely a stealthy bitch that’s more than willing to do the job. Her name is “Kiddo,” named after Uma Thurman from the Kill Bill films. Pretty fitting, don’t you think? Well, I’m proud of it—proud of my Kiddo ;)

If he ever finds me again, the play-by-play of what would happen is now also seared into my amygdala—from the fear I feel just imagining seeing him again, down to the smell of his black leather combat boots and body odor. I’ll know he’s here, and the memories will all come flooding back:

It took almost 1 decade to escape him for good. It took 2 decades to have the courage just to write about him. It took 3 decades to meet the first kind gentleman in my entire life. It took almost 4 decades from the day I was born to find self-love. He is NOT taking a single thing away from me again.

But this massive man with his roaring voice will surely be black-eyed and screaming at me. I need to remember what matters. I can’t get distracted or crumble into pieces. I need to remember what Mister taught me:

1) Just breathe and focus on your target, not the gun.

2) Keep your arms strong and grip tightly.

3) Squeeze the trigger, don’t pull it.

4) Keep your eyes open, and never shoot to injure (only you can finish it).

If he tries to attack me or step foot into my home, it’s either him… or him. Turns out, I can still contribute to the morgue of my dreams, because Kiddo and I have unfinished business…

*click-click*

1) Heart: for stealing my life’s passion.

2) Lungs: for every time I couldn’t breathe.

3) Dick: for every time he forced me to my knees, screaming.

And just like the first time I escaped his captivity, the last words he ever heard from my beautiful voice, that I still have:

“Shhh it’s okay… go back to sleep…

I’m just going to send your mom some flowers…”

4) MOUTH: for my condolences.

Human Head Flower

A “Those Damn Enigmas” Production

Based on true events, but no one was harmed writing this story.

I had once been married to the sea, however I now sought a divorce. To escape the abuse those waves had inflicted upon me. Taking all my brothers and my men, bonded eternally to her depth and cruelty.

The wildwood now my refuge, greeting me as a foreign invader, falling silent with every step I take against the softened moss and snapping twig. Yet the calling of my name still flows along the smooth wind, pulling me along as an animal on a leash. If I had known the Siren dwelled in pond water, I would have never come here.

I get drunk and talk about my mom. I get really angry when I'm hungry. There's a fine line between complaining and just generally hating everything, and I'm riding it like a an escort, sometimes in a similar vein, just going with the flow until I get paid.

I close my eyes instead of rolling them. Don't get me started on other people driving. Before coffee, you best not talk to me. Every morning there's a security guard who greets me at the door, I can't talk at 7am so I nod and give him a grim little smile, go to the coffee machine and pound caffeine like I might win an award for obliterating sleepiness. But then I can't take the anxiety drugs used to calm me down, because with coffee, the drugs make me shake uncontrollably, a seizure of two worlds colliding.

Did I mention I talk about my mom a lot? As it turns out, when you hurt someone, really get to the part of them that hurts anyway, and then screw into it like a screwdriver hell bent on breaking the screw, that gets to some good conversation points in therapy. I go to therapy. I go to therapy and rant about my mom, and bad drivers, and security guards who are too cheerful - I ask, are they trying to screw me, too? Are all people screwdrivers, and I'm the screw, waiting to be used?

I think I just need some coffee, or a drink. Or both. But remember: I can't take the anxiety medication with either one, so the anxiety medication doesn't get taken very much at all.

My mom and dad took full advantage of the debauchery of the 1970's. In fact, I was told that my mom took acid with my dad at an Emerson, Lake, and Palmer concert and a week later she found out she was 8 weeks pregnant will little ol' me. Which explains the bad trip I had in kindergarten (The cow on the Elmer's Glue Paste called me the Walrus. Goo goo g'joob). It also explains my random ability to smell sounds and hear colors.

Some people are born with a legacy. They may have grandpa's ears, mom's smile, and dad's lack of penile length and girth. My legacy? I was born on probation, had a training wheels case of sclerosis, and a copy of, "My First AA Handbook" clutched in my little fist. This was the less than auspicious beginning to my life.

I was raised in a chaotic haze of neglect, meth fumes, and counting the days until the welfare check showed up. Somehow I managed to buck my family's preoccupation with burning out instead of fading away. I did well in school, avoided the criminal justice system, and since I didn't become a connoisseur of meth, I kept a full head of teeth.

Still, you can educate the trailer trash boy and take the trailer trash boy out of the trailer park, but you can never take the trailer trash out of the boy. As such, I have never met a psychotropic medication I didn't have an appropriate diagnosis for. I can still tell you the SNAP benefit (that's food stamps to those who grew up in a nurturing environment where parents had jobs and/or put the needs of their kiddos first) to meth exchange rate. I can tell you the horrors involved in trying to digest gov'ment cheese. If you call it, "Government Cheese" you're either too young to remember this colon blocking government handout or had parents who understood that the refrigerator was for more than Stroh's Lite beer and ketchup packets. Finally, like all my family members, I am extremely fertile meaning that before I had myself neutered for the good of humanity my love lava could impregnate with extreme ease. This fertility can be directly linked to the sad fact (and example of Ma Nature's sick sense of humor) that the least capable humans can crank out kids faster than China can crank out knock-off electronics. Ultimately, this insures that CPS social workers, the welfare department, drug dealers, and those employed in the criminal justice system have total job security. It's our humble gift to you and the economy.

In short, cut me off, take the last donut, or STEAL MY ENERGY DRINK FROM THE BREAKROOM FRIDGE and I will make it my mission to insure that my children both date and procreate with your children. Hope you like Lynyrd Skynyrd, because their music will be featured heavily at your kids and my cum fruit's weddin'! Everybody fucking sing! IF I LEAVE HERE TOMORRRRRROWWWW...

Heedless of the damp newspapers drifting along the languid current, he waded further towards his flooded van. Yesterday's trash strewn across a fold-up table was scattered, while the travel chairs, the tacky table tarp, the notebook - all gone forever.

"There you are," she greeted him. A puff of smoke escaped her lips. He prayed it was from a cigarette.

"How much damage?" he asked.

"Engine's drenched," she replied nonchalantly. "Maybe it's time we-"

"No."

"Jeez. Have it your way," she dropped the cig into the murky water. "But know this - I'm tired of you leading us into trouble."

I sit, sipping my coffee. Briefly, I peer around the large screen in front of me, and look out the window. I watch a small robin lands on the concrete walkway. I wonder how many times its landed there. Is it happy? I look up at the clouds, slightly overcast, I think. Maybe 75 degrees? As I'm trying to decipher the weather, a person approaches the door. Ding-Dong, the buzzer at the door shrieks as the glass door opens.

A tall, slender woman with jet black hair and a long red dress walks in. Her dress has a slight wrinkle on the left hand side, but I don't pay too much attention to it. Behind her a little girl follows, taking shelter behind the woman.

"Hello!" I say in an upbeat voice for the hundredth time of the day. I'm even surprised by how shrill and annoyed I sound.

"Hi, we're here for an appointment," the woman says in a dull tone. Her voice is rough and grainy. I notice dark circles that swirl around her eyes, and something tells me it has to do with the kid.

"Okay, and who is the appointment for?" The question is automatic. I have become so used to repeating it that I don't even have to think anymore. I'm a robot, what am I even doing here?

It's a question I've too often pondered. Why don't I leave, I'll ask myself. It's not like there's really anything in Vermont for me. I could pack up tonight, be gone tomorrow. I could go to New York like I'd always hoped, and get a job at a restaurant until I make it as an actor. You know, I think I might do it. Wait, what if I can't make it? What would my parents think if I left everything I've ever had behind. I can't go, I'm making a living here. I have an OK life!

Just like that, it becomes a passing thought. It gets pushed completely out of my head, and I return to work. "It's for Cassie" she mumbles. Leaning close, she whispers "she has to get a tooth out, the poor baby!"

I scroll down the page on the giant screen until I find Cassie. 11:45 AM, CASSIE ROGERS, I click on it, and the name becomes highlighted in green. "She'll be fine," I absentmindedly respond. "Okay, she's all checked in. Please just sit in the waiting room and her name will be called out soon."

The woman lets out a dissatisfied grunt, and returns to her daughter. I find my eyes wandering back outside. Slightly overcast, I think. A robin lands on the concrete, and I wonder if it's happy. A person approaches the door, and everything remains.

And on the page was nothing.

The cold night a secret escape.

Cracked ring on the ballroom floor.