The purplish-red onion sat in your palm.
Like my heart, you held it firmly.
As if afraid, it would roll onto the dusty
floor. Quietly, you reached
for a knife. The ceramic one we bought
together, a lifetime ago. You
said it would never blunt, stain, or rust.
Unlike us, lovers cast in iron, now
decayed. Blunt, stained, without trust.
The crunching sound, two halves.
One always bigger than the other.
Your fingers, peeling apart the skin,
so gentle, so familiar. A lifetime
of thickened walls, grown in muddy
fields. Torn away like scabs.
You chopped methodically, from left
to right. From right, to wrong. Pieces
of flesh scattering across the wooden
board. Bruises, an ugly, purplish-red.
The crushed remains, scraped
into a plastic bowl. The type that said
disposable, breakable, vulnerable.
You reached for another onion,
a white, unblemished one. Found
while wandering alone
in the supermarket. I left that day,
tears in my eyes-
for I stood too close, while you
chopped.