All the liquid drained from your body,
Replaced by an artificial chemical
But the outer casings still real
Like the housings of sausages
You will last forever, perched at the
Pinnacle of the ski jump
As though reaching for your
Medal attempt, and you too,
The couple etching their
Love into the ice in cuneiform
Graceful script,
She is eternally arched above
Your head, mid-spin,
So naked and pure
You not only don't need skates
But don't need skin,
You are shed of identity,
But you still have your eyes,
Having been fixed
In the window of time
Before they cloud over,
Still full of color like synthetic
Emeralds. As they
Say, as she, the most recent
'she' in my all-too-real story
Reminded me--'you signed up
For this.' In the name of
What occult science
Are you held in perpetuity,
Never to fall from your apex,
Never to conclude your climb
With an inevitable descent,
You are robbed of your final
Clause, the death
Of the body to match the death
Of your spirit, the one thing
They couldn't preserve. Are
You my parents, looking back
At me from age-tinted decades,
And in the same way myself
Looking back at myself,
Reminding me of the death
Of my own self, the illusion
Of me standing here but
At least you don't hide anything,
Even your penis, reach for
Medal-winning extent. Reminding
Me I am already dead.
The future is now,
But there is no now,
There is only the blood
Threading its way through
The fine lacework of the capillaries,
Under the intense, almost
Inconceivable pressure
Inside the concoursing veins,
That somehow manage never
To burst, the hands on the
Clock never sag under the
Weight of time, exploding the
Glass in front of their face,
The glass that holds you,
Organs calcified, perfect and fibrous,
Any extraneous skin or fat
Shed like seconds from
The skin of time, the pulse
Inside the chest: there is a day
When you will look at them too
And they will look back at you
And you will see yourself
Already eviscerated.

Brian Staker