Paper Chaser

by Sarah Gamutan

They wake up by their selves and
pull one another from their pale cozy
beds. They jump off the wooden chairs
and start to impress us with their faces as
they start to light the room which was left
by its owners two scores ago. They turn their
heads to the window and rhythmically throb
the glass screens and start to rip their thin bodies

as if they are nothing but a paper. At first, I
appear like a fairy and slyly slap their red faces;
yet, they uncontrollably cut their skins like they
are not at all torn. In fact, they only light a cigar in
a hot summer night with some fellow wee papers,
drink beers, talk their own paper language and cry
until they melt their fragile skins. They insist their skin
is made of gold- though they are lethal. These creatures
brag that they live rarely but barely find their counterpart.