Stone Heart, by Vicki Khzouz

You know that moment when your heart learns how to speak?

That moment

when your heart decides to tell you

that you're nothing more

than the passing thought

of last week.

You know that moment when your heart

loses consciousness, leaving you numb?

That moment

when your heart makes you forget

where your smile used to comes from.

When it loses the ability to search

through the darkness, for a hopeful light.

When it can no longer find the strength to keep battling, the inevitably futile,

self-perpetuating fight.

You know that moment when your heart

mocks your desperate attempts to

elude your ill-fated looming pain?

That moment

when your arrogant heart whispers ridicule

until you realize it's telling you

that you're pathetically inane.

It's at that moment

that you can feel the weakness

compelling you to give in.

The violating instability is palpable.

Ambushing you

for the irrevocable collapse to begin.

And in that moment,

you can unmistakably hear

your heart admit defeat.

Clutching your chest,

you feel it slowly dying,

hardening into solid concrete.