Brian Eckert

The morning coffee is
a toast to the new day, a
ceremonial offering to the dawn.

Making the bed is
hope for a fresh start, setting things straight
for the next stage of dreams.

Whiskers in the sink are
a reminder of my animal nature that
each day I must repress if I am to get out,
make a man of myself.

A tie is the noose I wear
as a cross, a
token of my sacrifice, my
daily martyrdom.

My dress shoes are a
shiny black steed that
carry the hero through
the wasteland.

The dinging that indicates the train is approaching
is the bell tolling
for me.

The train ride is lustful, a
great phallus penetrating the damp
flesh of the city.
I daydream that time stops and all aboard
are frozen, except myself, and
I walk through the cars examining their
Disguises,
comparing them to my own.

Each laugh I hear is a battle cry, announcing,
“The world hasn’t broken me yet,”
but on some days laughter isn’t enough, so I
decide to howl instead.
I rear back, begin to bellow like a beast…
…and then they come for me, drag me away kicking
and screaming, a blow to the head and my world goes black…

I wake up in a hospital bed, the surgeons
wearing Halloween masks and telling me,
“Things will be fine, m’boy, now we’ve got
just the thing for what’s ailing you.”
They gouge a long shank through my eye socket, and
there is no pain,
only blood….
It spills out like a
river overflowing its banks. Soon,
the room fills, a drain opens on the floor, spinning us
around, then
down, down down…

I wake up to find myself reading the newspaper. The front page headline reads:
Lobotomies Making a Comeback as a Way to Ease Worker Discontent
The weather is mild and unemployment sits at 8.43679%.
The price of real estate is up, but should soon steady.
I laugh fully, deeply, hysterically,
until a pleasant looking woman comes in with
a steaming cup of coffee that I
slurp down with a gilded straw, then
with one leap vault from the table,
land perfectly in my shiny dress shoes, and
blast through the wall.