The Book of Weston

In the school gym, my peers gather

on the court strewn with glass,

bricks, rebar, electric prods.

The participants chat excitedly,

stretching and jogging in place

as if they'd trained for this.

Then a buzzer sounds, and I stare in horror

as my classmates turn to savages.

I see Sarah bleeding from the nose

and laughing like a hyena before

she's knocked to the ground

and jabbed in the neck with a buzzing taser.

Nick sucker punches John who falls,

skull cracking like a gunshot

against the laminated floor. He seizes.

Foam pools from his swollen lips

while Nick does a victory dance.

The impact of a concrete block

knocks Kate's eye clean out of her head

and she cups it in her hand

smiling numbly at it.

Sneakers slip as bodily fluids pool

across the basketball court,

and the snapping of young bones echoes

through the room.

Dead-eyed custodians roll out carts

full of rancid food for ammunition:

moldy cheese, sauerkraut, rotten eggs.

The students bleed and laugh and vomit together.

On the sidelines, I avert my eyes

and stalk along the perimeter, stomach tense,

bile tickling my throat.

They've cracked, all of them.

What demon whispers to them,

and why have I not heard its dark voice yet?

Teachers and parents cheer in the stands,

and for the first time, I realize

the origin of their scars

I'd previously taken for granted.

I slip out into the parking lot

crowded with tailgaters watching

the proceedings on TVs.

People murmur as I hurry by,

wondering how I escaped unscathed.

I stare at the solid ground,

confused, agitated, superior, alone.

My uncle and his niece bump into me,

greeting me excitedly on their way in.

I try to tell the girl she wouldn't like it

but my uncle shushes me, shaking his head.

He wants her to enter without warning,

and I feel a heaviness in my heart.

They're all in on it.

Suddenly a young teacher lunges out

of the gym doors and points at me

and shrieks, Somebody grab him!

I flee into the woods behind the school,

branches whipping, briars tearing at my skin.

I stumble over a lumpy mass

hidden beneath the leaves and fall,

and the shape rises slowly,

as if from a long slumber:

a young man in his late teens,

head shaved, a crooked row of stitches

snaking across his forehead. He stands

hunched and stares with sad eyes.

Who am I? he croaks.

What am I doing here?

I retreat, horrified, as dozens

of other leaf-piles stir.

I scramble down a rocky hill,

under a fence, and into a plowed field

that stretches to the dark horizon.

Above: relentless stars,

and in the middle, a gaping black spot

growing. Something is coming

and it's swallowing stars.