Acrimonious Effigy

A beautiful broken doll
Pieces strewn about the wooden floor
Your face almost real
Eyes almost alive
Pleading
The picture of shattered innocence

I kneel down to repair you
Your jagged edges piercing my skin
I gently reassemble your every appendage
No minute fragment is abandoned

My love becomes adhesive, balm and varnish
Your original splendor restored
As good as new

Beaming with adoration, I display you on the highest shelf

Once more your face is almost real
Brow furrowed
Lips compressed in a smirk

Once more you tumble hard
Almost as if you hurled yourself

I try to break your fall, a moment too late
And land on your jagged edges

Blood dripping from my face and chest,
Once more I reassemble you with bleeding hands and guilt
As though I had broken you myself

Through my tears, I glimpse another smirk
And reluctantly leave the pieces as they lay.