Silver Branches

Silver branches and a cold black ground that pushes out

plants and flowers lined with gold and ruby,

and those who meditate inside the house are trampled on

by the gardener who picks those plants,

force-feeding them to those who were once in peace.

"Swallow silver branches whole"

and he takes out their eyes with a wooden fork.

He boxes their ears and watches them struggle

yet never once would he offer to help.

Stuffed into their nose is the leaf and the petal,

the gold and the ruby gems that were once so fresh

but now are heavy, rotting with pulled force

and their roots are nowhere to be seen like

one who fell down the stairs and suddenly broke

their neck. He gaslights a lamp that will drip oil

through the wooden ceiling and leak until it

drips, drips, drips upon their foreheads.

They suffer silver-branched covered in plants,

sleeping alone they wish they were dead.