A Malcontent

     I see it now. And I know how it must look to you. I am a religious fanatic. A terrorist. A kamikaze, here to lay fuses to our melded hearts.

     I stand with the explosives stuffed in my book bag and observe the half-hearts leeching the life from one another. It is a wicked circle; the first taking of strength and weakening when the second reaches in to take back what the first has stolen.

     Outside, politicians protest the decision they think I haven't yet made, saying this is how it's always been and is worldwide. They insist the two hearts make each other stronger. But in the silence, here alone to view the gore of their joining stitches, I see that our hearts are crippled. The bonding threads ooze. The blood is infected. They are mutilated. Unable to love.

     And so I unzip my bag and lay the explosives on the seam of the hearts, like an offering to the God I still believe deemed these two beating wounds should meet, to tear them apart.

     Ducking out from under a rib, I emerge into society again and am accosted by the crowd’s noise. With the remote in my hand I shout over them.

     "I am a freedom fighter  in a holy war. And  I  regret  nothing."

The hearts detonate.