Cadaver

As the pungent smell of the formalin danced its way into my nose, my eyes began to swell.
Burning but not disgusted or emotional.
Intrigued but ignorant.
Trying to look for an objective heart, compare it with the ones we see in our atlases.
Not realizing this is a human who wore a soul inside of him.
Whose ‘objective’ heart beated strong and loudly for his lover.
Who bled red blood just like me.
As the teacher picked up his heart, as if it was a shirt he was interested in buying but couldn’t afford.
Examining it to see if it was worthy and undamaged enough to use as a prop for his class like this ‘cadavers’ past lovers.
My eyes began to examine the ‘cadaver’ – still objectively.
Until they landed on his fingertips, until I could see the prominent lines of his fingerprints.
Then it hit me.
He was just like me, he was just like us, he was not ‘an it’ anymore.
He was a human, just like I.
His fingertips caressed peoples souls, his hands were used in prayer to submit to his lord.
His eyes fell in love with the beauty of the world, they were once the tunnels to his heart but now they were shut as if he never existed, as if he was just a prop, an interactive tool for us ‘to learn’.
As I look at his abnormally large liver, I begin to wonder about how many scars in his heart lead him to drown his soul, in drunken nights.
How many tears did he shed, how many lovers used his heart just like a prop.

Maybe he lost someone, not a lover but a child.
Maybe the depression lead him to illegal bars that filled his cup with whiskey, that catalyzed his death.
Maybe he was just a mess that did it for the adrenaline.
Maybe he had a family waiting for him at home but the spine that once made him a man got broken on his journeys and he couldn’t face reality anymore.

Or maybe he died from unnatural causes
but he died alone,
and now he’s here- laying on a table like an object,
soulless and heavy,
like a prop.