Torture Through The Ages
By Andrew Lafleche

 

There are years to go in this life of be-
coming. Still much to bleed in offering.
Pull sweater thread until the guts fall out
—more so, whatever lie has been assumed.

 

Whisky tastes better over ice, dashed ale,
love lost heals after—hasn’t happened yet.
Though now I don’t remember her birthday
—until realized, I forgot: March 16th.

 

Glad today is just a regular date—
a little shoulder glance toward the past
turned the prophet’s wife into a pillar,
tears for those god abandoned to the dead.

 

She said terrible things in beautiful
ways. Might be how everybody tells lies.
Finally night descending, enough times
waiting out the day can all it be had.

 

Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight
—magic spell I will whisper and believe
they vanish into a blackest of nights—
only the promise of morning’s new light.

 

Andrew Lafleche from Canada is the award-winning poet and author of No Diplomacy, Ride, and Spring Summer, Winter, Fall. His work uses spoken style language to blend social criticism, philosophical reflection, explicit prose, and black comedy. Following his service as an infantry soldier in the Canadian Armed Forces, Lafleche received an M.A. in Creative and Critical Writing from the University of Gloucestershire. He lives on a farmstead in the Bonnechere Valley.