Songs
And my songs are burned, so I will never have to sing. To not sing is the greatest pleasure, much more so than watching the poor singers, the ones who had no reprieve from standing in the sun that never left, that pins them to the ground, a butterfly on a board, while their mouths open and close and their song bellows forth. Each song is written by the singer, who works under pressure to make their songs hideous, to blare like a donkey wishing for death, or the squawk of a crow falling from the fired sky a last time. Songs are the most hated thing, here beneath the constant cacophony of planets roaring past and stars flashing into the final fire. Why do we not love a beautiful song, I once asked a young boy, and the answer given was the sharp black-cutting stare of the men around me. There is so little language here. We learn from the looks, the touches, the prodding into movement. Only I, in the deepest recess of our subterranean home, scribble and hum my beautiful songs, then burn them, before I am discovered and left outside, alone, to go mad in the heaven’s screams.