DIVINATION
Her wings, massive and muscular, spread above me, blocking the sun and leaving me in her shadow. A single feather, once-white and downy, sinks through her shade.
I trace its fall and it’s gone.
Bearing the weight of the world, she hefts the blade.
High. Holding. Flashes of cold sun.
I trace its fall.
Gullet to groin, she splits me.
The steam from my belly warms the chill air.
Organ by organ, each is extracted.
Each appraised.
Each one is studied, flung to the ground and studied again.
Every part of me a puzzle to her; a bloody riddle, blueprint in red. Every part reveals some new secret and as a disassembled whole, their story of the future is constructed.
With nothing else left, at last, she holds the heart.
“It doesn’t look good”, she says.
It joins the rest of my life on the ground as she turns away.
* Gerry Hayes mostly sits around all day and drinks tea. Occasionally, he writes stuff and sends it to strangers so they can humiliate him and debase his efforts. Apart from the self-harm to dull the shame of failure, it's not a bad life. Like I say, there's tea. Gerry's blog is http://stareintospace.com and you can have easily-digestible, bite-sized pieces of him on Twitter at @gerryhayes
