Salted Nerves

Come, let me show you
inside this wound
of salted nerves and
ruptured marrow.

Memory cuts up
glass beneath the skin -
cauterised,
infected, weeping.

Trapped voices
aching at the edges,
light caught up in the stitching.

I watched your shadow
move through the ruins
we called love.

You touched the wound
carefully, as though
it might forgive you.

But pain built its kingdom
quietly within you,

So even the stars look
infected through
the healing film of distance.