Thumb Stump

In the thrill of the moment,

My thumb, like an onion, is cut.

The top, gone in an instant,

Leaving behind a flap of skin.

 

A hat of dead white,

And beneath it, a plush of red.

Like a little pilgrim,

My thumb is scalped, just as the Indian's axe.

 

The carpet of my flesh rolls,

Straight from the heart,

And I step on it, clutching

A bottle of pink fizz in celebration.

 

From the gap, a million soldiers run,

Every one a redcoat, but whose side are they on?

I am ill, my homunculus,

And I've taken a pill to kill

The thin, papery feeling inside.

 

I am a saboteur, a kamikaze man,

And the stain on my gauze darkens and tarnishes.

The balled pulp of my heart

Confronts its small mill of silence,

And I jump, a trespassed veteran,

A dirty man with a thumb stump. ("Thumb Stump") by Courtney Weaver Jr.