JENNIFER PACANOWSKI
THE SCREAM INSIDE HIS HEAD
His face is emotionless like a stone carved with depth and perception.
His smile flickers now and again.
A genuine smile of appreciation
Not of happiness.
As he drives a low grumble erupts from his gut.
His eyes squint at the glare of sunlight through his windshield.
The sun burrows into the innocence he once had.
Through the pupil of his eyes the streams of light project a figure on the bridge.
The figure has no identity, no sex, no life light that surrounds the essence of man.
The sunset behind him resonates a bitter sweep of red,
The loss of today.
The blood carelessly smeared on the clouds for all to see.
Just as the bodies will soon be brushed aside as the black river inlets
into the man's mind.
As he drives with that sunlight,
Shredding and thrashing its vicious head with remorseless teeth.
The man drifts back into the desert.
Scanning, scanning the road feverishly for the bombs.
The brief darkness of the underpass tunnel grants a moment of relief.
There is a beating sound outside the car.
Is it left?
Is it right?
The man and his dog exchange confused glances.
The man ducks his head and stretches his neck out towards the sound from above
Than he is thrust back into the devastating life,
of a day in the desert.
The beating dragging sound persists.
POOFBOOM POOFBOOM POOFBOOM
The desert horizon lays out before him.
As the wind picks up in speed,
the micropellets of sand scratch against his sweat soaked face.
He lifts his hand that is covered by the rubber glove and smears the
sand all over his face into his eyes.
The sound comes closer.
He glances up to heaven as the large shape of the helicopter shades his eyes.
It approaches the heliopad carrying his wounded, his dead.
THE SCREAM embodies his mind.
Bounces off his skull.
Letting out the shrill, horrified and unrelenting wail for those
lost...forgotten.
Alone on the bridge the man with no soul, no sex, no identity.
Grips to the sides of his face.
The bridge clatters.
He sucks down the scream as society approaches.
And behind the cold sculptured face.
Are the eyes of death in the living war.
