Day 159

Today's words:

Sponge
Coffin
Night
Flesh
Foundation
Madman

Makeup sponge
In hand, he bent over the coffin.
He needed to finish the makeup before night
Fell, making it harder to tell flesh
From foundation.
Only a madman

Would have chosen this job, he thought. A madman
Or someone born into it, as he was. He stroked the sponge
Across the foundation
And leaned over the coffin,
Applying the makeup to the dead flesh.
Night

Was falling. At night
He became a madman,
Ravenous for flesh.
He stood up, threw the sponge
On the floor, and closed the coffin.
He'd been brought up with a strong moral foundation

But that foundation
Had crumbled under the weight of the eternal night
Of his existence. He felt like he was imprisoned in a coffin.
He knew he was a madman
But there was nothing to be done. As a child he'd been like a sponge,
Soaking up the scent and feel of the dead flesh

All around him. That rotting flesh
Became the foundation
For his madness. He kicked the sponge
Across the floor as he went out into the night,
A madman looking to put someone else in a coffin.

His life was a trap; it felt like a coffin
And he could feel his own flesh
Rotting. So he became a madman
And the foundation
For his madness was the night.
The next morning his co-workers found the sponge

On the floor. They opened the coffin and saw that the foundation
That had been applied to the flesh the night
Before was clearly the work of a madman with a sponge.