tattoo

by justina aura nemoy

days exist i crave new words
carved in ink on this body
traceries of despair of fury
lines etched in victorious consolation
climbing a scapula traversing a bicep
worn as bracelet around wrist

but those choked with poison gases
humanity destroyed in smokestacks
blackened skies above the pens
where jews gypsies gays immigrants
worked and starved til broken
tossed into death’s cold arms used up

stay needle from current skin
how can i forget jagged numbers
etched on left forearms of walking dead
when since november 9th
i feel the icy breath of hitler’s ghost
on all our necks?

no tattoo required to scream
“this cannot be the new normal!”
my voice and yours the tools
to inscribe better future onto
the flesh of this fractured world