I teeter at the edge of a long drop,
the sky blazing blue with a hint of a droplet
that graces my hair like a whisper of a kiss.
Below howls the rage of a river, tearing down
the canyon’s walls, deeper it digs
until its innards spit out into the sea.

Gnarled and twisted, the tree trunk grows
from the brittle sandstone, its roots precariously
perched like a sprinter in the blocks
right before the gun shot snaps the air.
Wind whips through the hair, the roar
of energy zaps through the nerves,
a conflagration that burns me to dust.

Hands press me deep into the murky froth,
the sour and tepid stench fills my lungs
and the world spins, twirls in a ferverish dance
just laugh it away, just launch it to the sun —

Blood smears the ground, soaks the world,
silent cries reverberate through the bones,
unheard, unseen, lost in streams of light,
each pulling the body until I snap in half,
caved in by the broken shards of life.

Words and images carved into my flesh,
tremble and beat through my soul
to the pristine pages of a new story —
each birth of character seeded by myself —
that glimpse in the mirror, until the sight
cracks and bleeds into the rivers of light.

Fractal by A. A. Zingler