Diagnosis

In the teeth of the storm I stand, gutted
It is as though some monstrous hand reached in and scraped me clean, meticulous
Impersonal 
Licking each delicious drop with a smile, wetly red and charming
I am bereft
The winds play me like some melancholy chime 
Whistling through the new crevasses of my shattering
There is a haunting beauty in the music of this dissolution 
Meaning runs out of it, sand through grasping fingers 
Grit in eyes too stubborn to weep, in a throat too proud to speak 
All is ash
Fertile ground salted, stinging 
Reminder of loss, of a life that can be lived hollow, after all, 
And the terrible cost of hope in the fierce heart of this consuming crucible