Backstabber

Inspired by the Dresden Dolls' song 'Backstabber'.

Canaries in coal mines know only the sound of birdcages

rattling and the colour of coal. Just as pretty little

women in masquerade masks know only the whirling of

petticoats and the sanguine bricks laying a path into

the moonlight. Canaries, though, have a knack of sensing danger

whilst the ladies in the masks only see glitter sunrises

before they're struck down with dusk.

Some people know only bruised egos rather than bandaged

knees. Albatrosses circle around floating self-images

and wait for them to plummet under the current to no

particular avail, and paper chains tie helium minds to

the gales outside windows, mistakenly believing that the

tracks of raindrops down freezing backs are signs of

approval from the ebb and flow of the sea.

We never ask if knives prefer mirroring those

who become constellations or creating tears

in shredding fabric. Somehow we all manage to 

assume that they relish the spaces between

spinal disks. An amateur mistake, the little

cardboard business-card of a backstabber who

knows only betrayal.

Author's Note

What did you think of the imagery?