Open Casket

They're cutting your chest
open as I write this,
the surgeon's knife drawing lines
as practiced and precise as the strokes
of my pen on paper.

I wonder how they crack the ribs
of a body so sturdy?

Now they're opening the encasement
of the most sacred chamber, never
meant to survive such violation.

Will they read the names of your daughters
scribed on walls of muscle, so much wetter
than they look on charts and diagrams?

Will they hear secrets
gathered during a lifetime
whisper through aorta and mitral,
startled by the advent of light and air?

They'll bind you back together
with their meaty hooks,
more like a butcher sewing a rolled roast
than a mother's careful stichery.

But will your generous heart
forgive such insult?

Perhaps it will wither away in sadness
at being incarcerated again
now that it has basked
in the forbidden joy of light.