Salt & Stone

This was for a contest on a different website. I had to make a poem using the word salt. This was the result.

He’s got salt in his eyes,

His mouth,

His mind.

Stone hands won’t rub it away

Because he can’t lift them;

They’re too heavy and so he let’s

The crystals bash around his mind

At night leaving skid marks on his brain.

It imprints-

It’s stuck,

it’s glued

Behind his eyelids and sometimes it burns

Too much to close his eyes, but they’re like bricks

So all at once his body turns into a battle field

And he loses every time, no matter what.

And he remembers when the monsters were only under his bed.

But Daddy can’t make these monsters go away;

Mommy can’t kiss the salt goodbye.

It’s stuck.

It’s glued,

And it burns his dreams like a

Fireball that’s right by his face-

He can smell his hair singe.

So despite the cup of water beside his bed,

And despite the pills and the doctors

He can’t get rid of the salt because

It’s stuck.

It’s glued

And it makes him worry that it’s all he’ll

Ever see,

Ever taste

Because nothing is working

To cure his stone limbs,

And his body isn’t an ocean whose waves will erode

The pain away so he can sleep at night without salt

Encrusted eyes and a bitter taste in his mouth.

He can’t even be bothered to move himself.

It’s too hard to walk with rocks in his pockets.

And that’s why Johnny left him, but before he did

He said that you can catch more flies with honey,

But vinegar is all he’s got,

Along with salt and stones that burn and sink him.

Now, he’s just hoping he’ll sink so low that he comes

Out the other side and things will be different