Descent : A rambling poem

life is a mask—
painted smiles stretched over rot.
flowers bloom / they drink blood from the soil.
every petal is a tongue of the dead.

breathe—
you call it living,
but it is only the sound of flesh
stalling before collapse.
every heartbeat = a drumbeat toward the grave.

the infant’s cry
not joy
not wonder
just terror at being torn from nothing
and thrown into slaughter.

do you not see it?
the beauty is a lie.
the sun spills gold
but the gold hides worms
gnawing inside your shadow.

death waits / not cruel,
not merciful,
just patient.
it does not blink.
your god does not speak.
your prayers rot in your own throat.

skin folds inward,
eyes glaze to glass,
the mouth a cave buzzing with flies.
your name is erased,
your face devoured,
your love forgotten—
time gulps you down like a drop of rain
lost in the ocean of never.

and yet we reach—
desperate hands groping
for meaning
connection
any proof we are more than meat.
but all we touch is air.
air.
air.

life is the cruelest trick.
we dress corpses in flowers
we sing hymns to emptiness
we smile at each other
pretending not to hear the silence
gnawing at the edges of our bones.

born alone.
die alone.
erased.
the void hums,
a song deeper than words,
and the soul trembles—
because it knows.