Onion

_{Stage 0:  Looking}

You pick up an onion
Scooping it out from its
Netted jail, wondering
What it would be like today,
Whether it would be
Strait-jacketed in a cast of
Autumn coloured skin or
Whether it would be
Pummelled
All over with
The shine of a well polished bruise,
The smear of congealed blood and purple dye.

(But when it’s hurting, it shows.)

_{Stage 1:  Peeling}

You pick up the onion
And your probing, pushing fingernails
Scratch the smooth, unassuming surface.
You drive a short knife into it
Lifting up its fragile skin
But where you expect a gush of red
You tap against another shell.
Shielding, hiding, cowering…
You rip away its thin blanket,
Scrunching, casting it away,
Brown-purple ashes in the wind.
And only then you realise
What a lovely, crunchy sound
It made.  

(But for all you know, it could’ve been a sob.)

_{Stage 2: Smelling}

As soon as you picked up that
Stripped naked ball-like lump
Your curiously averted eyes and
Your quivering nose begins to sting.
For locked away in the flesh,
Stories of grief and despair,
Melancholy and misery
Eat through your senses,
Assailing those nostrils,
Your downcast eyes,
Springing its clever trap,
Tapping into the deepest recesses
Of the beating organ that you call
Your guilty heart, tickling
Your conscience as gently, but as
Treacherously as a feather would,
Until it extracts from you
The streaming of unwanted tears.

(You’re not the only one crying though.)

_{Stage 3: Chopping}

As you raise the knife,
Your stomach rumbles,
Hungry not for the food
But hungry for the truth.
You bring it down.
The blade slices,
Crunching through
Numerous layers,
Constructed over the years
From the growth of shame,
Sadness and sickness.
You dissect it well,
Peeling apart layer by layer
Slice by slice
Horror by horror,
But you would never
Piece them together again.
Your only comfort to it
Is the blurry tears that splatter
And season it with watery salt.
Your trauma is echoed loudly
By metal against wood, through flesh
So tender and so soft
Now mutilated.

The last slice falls sideways,
Arteries and veins lining
The flesh but never pulse
With life.  You smile with
Relief, even though the onion
Lies in sickeningly even pieces
Before you.

(Strangely enough, both of you finally stopped crying.)

_{Stage 4: Cooking}

You warm up the fires
Of a black, burning Hell,
Saucepan-sized with the
Most heavenly-like beep.

You pour lovely, golden oil
Onto the Teflon-coated bottom
Watching as it covered all areas
Of possible pain relief.

You thrust the diced garlic
Into Hell’s hands first,
Pushing, flipping them
As they spit and whimper.

Then you scoop up the slices of onion
Cold metal against colder flesh.
You remain impassive despite
Murderous evidence in front of you,
The reminder of your failure
To provide non-existent duty of care.  
You say it is for the best
You say it is to put it out of misery
You say it has better purposes to serve
But you know what you say now
Are just unhygienic lies.
You throw them in and watch
Hell awaken with newfound energy,
Drowning the slices in oil,
Searing them with electronic
Heat, spitting as it licked its lips
From a meal well served.

(And after you have cooked your meal, you sit down on the table, eating delicately for once. You taste the shredded onion, and frown when you hear a crunch. But you continue eating.)

It’s just an onion.