Not Again
Don’t shock me again
I’ll smile and eat
the rubber meat
covered in
congealing red
sauce I’ll put on
a clean shirt
if someone brings me
one just don’t turn on
that machine and put
the needle away
~*~
Friday, July 26, 2019
Poem by Gregory Luce
Trigger warning: Institutionalized abuse
Not Again
Don’t shock me again
I’ll smile and eat
the rubber meat
covered in
congealing red
sauce I’ll put on
a clean shirt
if someone brings me
one just don’t turn on
that machine and put
the needle away
~*~
Biography: Gregory Luce, author of Signs of Small Grace (Pudding House Publications), Drinking Weather (Finishing Line Press), Memory and Desire (Sweatshoppe Publications), and Tile (Finishing Line Press), has published widely in print and online. He is the 2014 Larry Neal Award winner for adult poetry, given by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. He is retired from National Geographic, works as a volunteer writing tutor/mentor for 826DC, and lives in Arlington, VA.
Not Again
Don’t shock me again
I’ll smile and eat
the rubber meat
covered in
congealing red
sauce I’ll put on
a clean shirt
if someone brings me
one just don’t turn on
that machine and put
the needle away
~*~
Powerful, Greg Luce - thank you! Why the trigger warning?
ReplyDeleteIt's the editors' decision. This might be difficult for others who have been through the same thing.
Delete