© Joshua Ryan Dellinger, MD | Resident, Department of Psychiatry
we have no blades
we trade in the soul, scars
that linger there
circadian ghosts, shadows
sparks falling upon
fields that have never felt rain
a boy
not yet fourteen,
pulling his sisters from a burning house
scorched in the night
wind-lost timbers
60-years-old
rejoined, recalled by
the old nerves stinging
singing in their memory, still clear:
a daughter in the dust
scratching with birds
screaming in their memory, still new:
a daughter underground
her son left behind
four posts of a chair
compass rose of his prison
he has buried:
wife, father, mother, daughter, sisters
still he combs his hair neatly
still he checks the mail
another boy, 7
legs tight from the year
now begins to speak
five seasons after
he found his mother dead
face down in the morning
of an ordinary school day
tell me what would you cut from him
what would you bind
that could promise a remedy
to return what is lost
a woman
tearful in front of me
tells me her story
of lifelong neglect
then, as if in counterpoint,
the endless waves
of degradation and abuse
teach me the anatomy of the unloved
a man, outside
lifts a cigarette from the sidewalk
to save for later in the day
…
a girl, pregnant
bearing her father’s child
asks about vitamins
I hear his voice
see the words
pray to remove
or be removed
we have no blades
we deal in drugs and words
we have no blades
because we want to keep you whole
hole