He is fetal curled around it,

holding it to his midsection
as if
it were a rabid animal
ready to gouge out
his insides
were he to lose control
of it.
No one on the outside
knows
how fantastically lethal
it actually is,
but the daily blood it draws
convinced him
a long time ago.
He will grip it right to the
last moment of his
sad little melodrama;
then, like a decapitated
machine gunner
at Verdun,
he will grip it even
harder.