you hollowed me out with a plastic orange knife

pumpkin .

when you left me
there was nothing inside of me

i was all hollowed out.
you scooped out everything and left a hole
you hollowed me out then
were gone

like a jack o lantern
you hollowed me out
with a knife, a plastic carving tool, and a spoon
took out my insides
scraped out my heart
with everything attached and dropped it in a bowl and

it was all just play

you left me with a frozen, carved-out face
on the front porch
you left me Confused, breaking, broken, Hurting from the daggers
so that i could hardly breathe
i thought i had punctured a lung.
i would have cried but i couldn't
until later
then i couldn't stop.
you left me,
something that could only rot

you lit a candle and put it inside
i had let you in
and then you laughed at the flames
and at the crudely-cut face
and put the dunce cap on my head
and went on your way

i stayed and the candle cooked me from the inside

the heat burned my chest and my skin was boiling and i was FEVER
i was
burned
melted on the inside
from the inside out, from the heat and the boiling wax
       (rotted)
and i shriveled
and the cap fell into my hollowed-out self
and I was filled with smoke

and then the flames went out
and I was left in the dark
and it got cold.






everett mills