Horticulture/Arson

the mind is a terrible time machine;
The memories of how are so achingly present, their bitter shards colour everything.

Is is really so surprisingly that death begets death?
An eye for an eye.
Because it was not one person, but rather life, that slighted you.

You are an emotional horticulturalist,
And an arsonist.
But you always hold the match too close.

Dowse yourself.
Be careful not to miss the cheap seats.

At first, we thought they were fireworks.

We slammed our doors and windows and turned up our TVs. The few who braved the briefly illuminated chill quickly returned inside, unable to glimpse the rainbow sparks the distant booms had promised.

The strobe faded, and silence swallowed the darkness.

In the morning, the booming started again, but this time at our doors, and of familiar voices in the street. We tumbled blearily out of our homes, the familiar morning mist mingling with a foreign smoke. They threw our lives from our houses and they tore off our clothes; our secrets, strewn in the streets, illuminated in the dawn.

They cast us, naked, into our bare boxes, and left only silence.

In the evening, the booming started again, but this time slowly, methodically, crawling closer.

We closed our eyes and counted down to "me".