The Real Macabre

beneath the veneer of a stable self beneath the thin veil required to pass through our own everyday reality s/he bears just beneath her/his skin the gnashing of the teeth & s/he does it so well that one would never ever pick up on it--- and as americans, we are fixated on our own morbid fascination with death--- we go to theaters, we rent dvds, we make pilgrimages to the actual sites where murders have taken place (now turned into tourist traps) & we breathe it all in deeply, all in the attempt to get closer to the experience without jumping right off the edge ourselves--- we smell, taste & writhe in the slashing, gushing blood, knowing the names of all the famous serial killers by memory & waiting for another to pop up in the 6 o’clock news with butterflies in the stomach of mediocrity biting our nails as if we were just about to ask someone out on a date, but s/he continues in her/his own routine, having fed on the same culture that we have having consumed everything thrown at them & having grown weary of stimulants that just don’t work anymore, s/he is the next door neighbor of us all s/he resides in the apartment down the hall s/he may work in the schools with the children of the nation s/he may wear the uniforms of those that are supposed to save us & s/he may stand behind a pulpit or podium, carnivorous & full of a need for complete vengeance--- and yet the next time it does happen we sit in awe remarking “what a travesty,” listening to “experts” give their detailed histories pontificating quotidian comments like “if s/he hadn’t been a killer, s/he would have been able to do so much with her/his life,” as if not one of us knew where the real macabre lies.