Deadheading

Writer: Elizabeth Bates


The following poem is written by Elizabeth Bates, one of our Twitter Competition Winners!

Dread. Dreading aging. Dreading ripening. Dreading a world that eyeballs me and nonchalantly says, “Yes, that one’s spent.”

The day will come when the gardener, clippers in hand, stands before me, periwinkle hue fading, judges me and declares me unfit for this world. Expendable.

The Grim Reaper justifies a premeditated slice to the jugular and two metal blades close in around me, pressure escalating, like hands squeezing out the rest of the toothpaste from the tube.

In a matter of seconds my body has gone from withered—yet still living—to being someone’s physics experiment testing out Pascal’s Law. Soon, I am deoxygenated. Decapitated.

Deadheaded.