My Final Masterpiece

    Paint trickles down my arms, a gooey strawberry mess. My wooden paintbrush clattered to the floor; it sits, bristles clumped as a watered garnet halo drips from its coloured ends and onto the tiled floor. Vacated eyes close, air flowing into my lungs like a levee overflowed. Time reverses for my invisible cataract and hot breath slips out my nose and between cracked lips. Visibly but for no one to know, muscles in my face relax--the jaw I didn’t know was clenched releases its relentless hold on invisible prey stemmed from the way wretchedly red flowers find their colours. Stabbing paused, the sharp knife of my brow finally allows itself to arch rather than to flatten.

    Bright pools of cherry wine fall from crooked fingertips to the depths of a cracked canvas board. Each drop of poison paint lost means cotton money down a clogged drain, but I make no move to stop the flow. Holding my own lost hand, I carry myself to a place when I can feel myself again. The remains of a sink stands at my personal fore, perspective tainting the terrible picture of soiled dishes heaped high. Lucidity unfound, sudden clarity cannot lift the bloody roses binding a blindfold of constant reverie over immature naivete; nothing is wrong.

    Hands move to turn broken knobs, only to be stopped by the specter of china dishware. Muted motions of platters dropping by the dozen are near-transparent, clanging as they shatter into fragments. Echoing only gets louder as the banging holds its stead. Vaguely, I watch my limbs flail while my head defects and slams itself against filthy countertops perfectly clean. My arms are burning as the fire spreads down to trash-covered floors. Breath catches in the back of my throat as I remember I forgot to breathe. I smile as my lungs heave and my heartbeat fills the room of my hollow ears.

    Darkly, my blurred vision begins to clear. Fans whir, seconds out of sync while I settle on my glass-filled floor of grimy tile. A table topped with papers catches my sight and I lock in, searching for the crimson flags I cannot find. Seconds pass, I’d know what grisly horrors the letters held if only I stood on weakened legs but movement never arrives.

Unprompted, rain falls from the eyes of a brewing storm whose heart aches a steady beat despite white glass cutting its exterior. I don’t forget to see; my eyes no longer exist. The fire in my limbs grows and spreads, waxing but never waning as it screams symphonies in an undiscovered key. The storms in my eyes only urge the oil fire further as they pour spoiled gasoline down a face of strings and candlewax. Shells echo the sound of thunder in my ears as I deftly watch acrylics mix with watercolours. Holding a paintbrush, I watch a metamorphosis with broken shards of wooden razors. Cordial, I fall backwards into a personal crypt without a moments hesitation.