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UNDERGROUND VOICES: POETRY
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MATHIAS NELSON
God Fearing Blade This butterfly knife was made to kill someone: Mr. Shanahan, Mrs. Mulberry, little Erik, young Elise, maybe even Pee Wee Herman. Sharp, black so it doesn’t reflect, butterfly quick murder access. What’s it doing in my hand? I never thought about it really, until now my mind has been focused more on the brass knuckles in my pocket— a fighters tool, not necessarily a murderer’s weapon. But I just heard the rocks shift outside my bedroom window, rocks that line the house, right beneath the sill. And then I heard footfalls, running across the lawn, through dead leaves. The same thing last week. Someone’s been watching me, alone at three in the morning, smoking a bowl and listening for feet intermingled with Coltrane. This blade in my hand now makes me conjure this someone else’s warm blood hitting my face, my lips, my nostrils, dying my whiskers and blurring my vision red. I put the weed down, flip the blade in and out and stab the air so this someone knows I will go outside and gut a mother; but first I’m going to let Jane wear off by picking the pipe up, resting the blade in my lap, and lighting up, giving careful consideration to purchasing a gun so next time I can just shoot through the wall. But it’ll be daytime before Mary goes away, I think, better for me to see that it was nothing outside my window, nothing at all. Until someone grows gonads, breaks in and I have no choice. At least I won’t see my own face in this black black blade, my crazy eyes, my crazy sneer, my crazy sigh of murder. That’ll be a time to avoid reflections out of fear because I’m not ready yet to see God with the same blood on his hands. Mathias Nelson has poetry forthcoming in The New York Quarterly, Laurahird, and Adagio Verse Quarterly. His contact information and recent publications may be found at http://www.nyqpoets.net/poet/mathiasnelson |
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© 2008 Underground Voices |
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