remains

Alexia Partouche

Content Warning: Gore

there is something rotting in the woods behind my house,

gangrene moss on pale skin and empty eyesockets that still stare, ghosts of eyes past. you don’t say much when you meet it,

crouching in the weeds. “how’d it get here?” you ask, and your expression translates: “what the fuck did you do to end up with

this? how deep do your sins go, how damned is your soul?” the wind speaks for me, brushes against the leaves while you

wait for my answer. it never comes — some things can’t be explained, and you know this. the corpse in the woods defies

reasoning, and yet it makes sense, belonging like the maggots do in its flesh. some houses are built to be haunted, some people are

born to decay. the moon decided before you and i were born, that a carcass would wedge between us, the heavy line in the sand, and

this moment is the consequence of someone else’s choices. now it’s your turn to choose, when i put my hand on your shoulder and ask, solemnly,

“won’t you help me bury it?”