Martyr

This poem was recently published in The Idiom, Gordon College's literary journal.

Martyr

Roman sand
already spiced with death
burns your calloused heels
as you enter the shriekingarena;
bloodthirsty spectators drool at your fate.

Go swathe yourself in blood.
You cannot stop it. Be afraid
of the lion's teeth cascading
on limbs, breaking bones.
tearing flesh.

As your blood drains
into the sand,
spirals of life absorbed by the abyss
of dry heat and white noise,
remember the red medicine
that brought you here
victorious.