Infections

Steel shrouded my cold, lifeless orbs,
a blade with precision's edge,
slicing at the world with a surgeon's intent.

I thought I could produce healing
when my quill's scalpel
carved deep into bullet holes
infliction by circumstance's machine gun.

No pain I felt while operating,
faithful to record the surgery
extra thought given to details
about patient's reaction,
methodical observations
void in muse's empathy,
excusing when calloused strokes
shredded an inanimate practice vessel
as reason to not listen
for times a verse might scar.

In the shadows of my mental morgue,
where my insides stiffen
from rigor mortis passions,
came the consumption in death watch fascination
over the sun I thought would never rise
except to shine upon my fated plot.

But then I heard the moan of another,
one I thought my stanzas had cured,
its tones bleed deep into my deafness
until I felt at last a pulse that could taste
what my comatose palate had never known.

The flush unto my sense was born,
muse's whispering song of love I finally heard,
my soul infected with thawing eyes,
pen no longer an inked ax, nor lament's executioner,
lead by hands other than my own,
suffering from disease, not seeking cure,
finding in world I thought to filet in poetic form
hearts sprouting gardens
because my desert crypt thought my destiny and curse
was opened forevermore.