Food Processor Poem by Kim McInnis

I am the most useful thing you'd ever want.

I remember the way you glowed with excitement as you withdrew me from my florid, papery shell. The way you held me up to the light, which shone in slivers across my creamy exterior. You marvelled at the sleekness of my blades, the speed as which they promised to slice. You could almost hear the satisfying snip of steel sliding through tender, pulpy flesh; the soothing whirr of electricity coursing through my form. You said I was perfect, the only thing you were missing.

Only now it's been years since I've seen you. It's been year since I've seen anything at all, aside from musty darkness and the occasional gleam of a dim lamp casting shadows on cardboard boxes - my only companions in this land of dust. Here my smooth plastic body no longer shines; my silvery blades go unsharpened, unused, unseen. And how I've longed to feel even the tiniest buzz of current flowing through the circuit of my veins. But nothing comes: only silence and the deadness of the air.

Still am I perfect? Still I am missing.

(Misplaced?)

I am the most useful thing you'll never need.