I collect people like canker sores in the mouth of a masochist. Raw-flesh, kept wet. And the blush of it turns white with how it can’t grow back over new. I build them up along my gums. Let them tear across the scarred, pink insides of my cheeks. Throat craving slow-crawl of saliva, copper-tinged. How many ulcers does it take to get to the center of my mouth? Wait. That’s not how that goes...but, then again, this narcissist wasn’t built in a day. And I only know how to write about me. It’s like searching for you in a me-stack...huh. Not sure about that one. I am eating myself alive because nothing else knows how to fill me. Ouroboros, self-devouring. I am diving into my own rib cage. Grave-digging my innards. Viscera-cemetery. Mausoleum-me. Maybe I can kill two relationships with one mental breakdown. Throw enough bodies into graves. Eventually something will stick. Damnit. Wrong again. And nothing stays buried anyway. Stop tonguing that ache. It’ll never heal.

What brings you to this poem today?

Is it inspiration for your own works?

Or curiosity for what I have to offer?

Or some else entirely?

If I were a better poet

I'd be able to make these lines rhyme

and find the words in enough time

to publish this while the challenge is still open.

Oh wait

I did rhyme.

Nice!

but that was an accident I swear.

Anyways,

There is nothing to see here reader

so bye-bye for now

and have a wonderful day!