words

i find that i have lost some things
and my teeth are all rotting,
my gut is wide with excess
and though i trimmed the fat
from my habits
the flesh will not fade.

my blood is all washed out
and i sleep in doom and sweat
and i know, i know
you find this weak and uninspired
but the truth resides deep
within the etching of these letters,
the soul within the sound they make
like the clawed entrapment
of bitter genius and newborn rhythm.

my words will live through fire
and the ones i left behind
will burn on and on and on
and they will dream in smoke,
they will thrive in charred repose
and those grey walls will remember
the hours i breathed great spumes of ash
and wrestled with flame.

-S.C. Martinez