This broken brain of mine projects
a six-foot, shadowed silhouette
of a puppet, strung-out and plucked
by someone who looks and sounds
exactly how I may too often seem.

The void inside me quickly over-swells,
and strange skin transforms to spread
while I am left alone to wither.
Shapeless and hollow, that pit,
it smiles through me and whispers.

So I decay away and drink
until my thinned, cold-blood
becomes warm, well whiskeyed,
and hope these arctic words
no longer freeze inside of me.

That midnight marionette man
has cut and stolen all strings
to wrap and embalm my body
with rot-gut mangled wire,
and I no longer seem to care.

He and I will forever dream
together in this new coffined body.
Both of us, just too-tethered puppets,
lying in wood grained weight begging
for new strings to bring us back to life.