the final testament: love letters from the morgue

the fluorescent lights don’t flicker here—they shine steady, sterile, unblinking. where you once would've heard a soft heartbeat now only the hum of refrigeration units are audible. a low drone, drowning out the last words of the dead that were spoken under my breath, the sobbing over a lover that i do not remember. 

a tag is looped around my hallux, if thoughts could still race my brain i would compare it butchered meat—specifically veal—that is awaiting purchase. 'jane doe' is inscribed in a strangers hand, if life still rushed through my veins this would decorate me in goosebumps, but in this state i am content with the coldness of being forgotten as this freezer has me frostbitten already. if i had a lover once i wonder if i ever traced their spine the way the mortician’s fingers now press against mine—clinical, detached, searching for something that no longer resides within me. i imagine they would've whispered my name against my skin—let it melt like sugar on their tongue, but as i try to recall the shape of their mouth, all i taste is formaldehyde and i realise that all sweetness has rotted away. 

my enclosure is cold and this steel highlights my pale skin, i fear i will fade away altogether. a plastic sheet tugs at my flesh, static clinging to strands of hair that will never feel fingers combing through them again. if life still circulated my lungs i would be fearful that i will suffocate. 

they move me around like furniture—as if i am not worth noticing, nor any different than the other cadavers. soon, they will cut me open. my skin will be peeled back and my organs will be weighed, notes will be taken on the pallor of my tissue, the stiffness of my limbs. they will search for cause, but they will not look for meaning. no scalpel can carve out who i once was, no incision can expose the life i once lived. and when they are done, they will sew me shut again, a poor attempt at restoring what has already been lost. if vibrations still blessed my vocal cords i would cry that i was warm once, that blood coursed through my veins, that my hair blew in the wind, that i was really, truly, alive. 

but i have no voice. not any longer. not ever again.

still, if you find this—if by some miracle my words reach you—please say my name. indulge in it for a moment, rub it along your gums, swallow it softly but don't keep me away. remember me, even if its only in passing, even if its only a murmur beneath the hum of the morgue.