I opened up to you,
Told you my story.
All you did was crack my spine,
Rip out my pages
Until all that was left
Of me was a cover.
A skin
With scrambled words
And indecipherable sentences
To be judged by my appearance.
I lay there as a stamp
Marked me with a bad review.
Time passed, and I still lay there
Unwanted and untouched
At the back of the shelf
Where nobody would notice me
Until the shelves were cleared
And I was found by someone
Eager to make sense of me
Without a second glance
At my plain cover
Or the faded gold lettering on my face.
-- 16 September 2014, Christian Stricker
