Purple

The lush, pink skin of my stump arm has turned Purple.

Beauty, stripped from the surface, howling a warning siren of death.

I abuse this skin and Purple has arrived to spread the news.

Fifteen years of scrapes on metal in a pursuit of passion.

Brass, Bronze, Steel, Nickel.

Shifting pigments on this leathered pad.

Should I refrain?

Do these warnings scorch my body as a final notice?

No.

I take pride in this decay.

This badge of Purple reminds me of who I am.

It is a monument to my dedication.

I sacrifice my arm’s beauty to my art and in turn, forge an equal beauty.

This superficial, pristine pink has made way for my brutish Purple.

My battle scar.

‘I’ve no use for you, Pink. Preserving you is a blockade on Truth’s path’.

On my most fervent days - chasing a deeper Purple - I dance, briefly, with Red.

Red has connotations.

I interrogate my Purple. I beat it into submission, in search of answers.

‘Speak, damn you!’

As Red cries out, I see the barbarism of my approach and I recoil.

Yet,

This Red fights in my corner. It rears its taboo head in a microscopic patchwork of sores, burns, grazes, scratches; then heals itself, all the stronger, bolstering the leather as a brother in arms.

I am my disability.

And I am the degradation of my disability.

I am not defined by them, but am one with them.

I charge forward with pride; adorned with the scars of my past.

My Purple is mine and I nurture it.

No one will take that away.