AN INFERNAL CACOPHONY.

INFERNO.

I wore it every day, the monster’s face

It made me swim in miles,

rivers of blood, reaching up, 

squelching up to my knees, then my waist,

until it met my chin, had me barely striving to stay

afloat. 

Made me feel with fingers pricked by needles

Made me feel shivers down my spine, hands at my throat,

down my back, whispering shouts in my ear at all times.

I could feel its horrid grin forming underneath, 

on my own face.

The repugnant mask I wore,

its fat black eyes, like a dead pig,

a master of beetles, a playground for illness,

With it on, I had no need or wish to be something else

It moulded me out of wax, dried out pine needles, 

The darkness when a door is left slightly open

and you’re too afraid to close it. 

A witch poppet to be used when needed and thereafter

discarded.

Neither Jesus nor the Devil could save me from what I’ve become.

The demon provided false truths in order to undo me,

but it provided safety, and so its will had to be satisfied.

I have destroyed myself, ripped out my own heart, 

raised it in sacrifice and held it mid-air

The monster’s long sharp tongue inching closer and closer, 

twirling and twisting around it-

But I threw it to the ground and ran anywhere

to start anew; (the only thing left to check off 

when I look at my list of things to burn, is you.

But I cannot do that without burning myself with you.)

Perhaps the only way to eat the devil is for you to become the devil too.

I walk through the fire, pass Lucifer by, pay Acheron his passage fee.

I walked as far as I could get-

At the edge of hell I dare walk through the gate of many gaping mouths

Seeing nothing but darkness, hearing nothing but

screams of those damned before me, I fall and fall and fall

I land under a bright night sky, where the stars do not twist themselves 

in fury and the demon can no longer reach me.

And to a place I come where everything shines.

PURGATORY. 

The man in black says, as he makes me kneel in front of the altar

This is his blood

In my mind, I turn the wine back into water, I drink from the cup

The man in black also says

This is his body

So I bite desperately at the flesh, eat it away

Lick at the sharp bones that remain

Is it too late to take the bread?

The blood spilt on the floor hums back 

YES, YES, YES!

It runs down my arms like rivers from

where I pulled out my heart

Father, I pray tell me, in your holy learnéd opinion, 

does heaven consider me a sinner

or a saint, for what I have done 

and for what I have battled?

Am I pure or am I dirty for the things that I do?

Please tell me, in God’s opinion, 

am I Lilith, that first whore, or am I Eve, the first woman

who knelt to a man? Does he even see a difference between 

the two?

Why so fearful?

Perhaps I am none. I have been to hell and back,

now it’s part of who I am. 

Fuck your holy blood, your God and your whore for

I’ll have none of it. 

Maybe I’m God, maybe I’m nothing. Hatred is the only thing

bordering dangerously close to love.

In the midst of the crowd of scared sheep

dying to repent, to ascend,

I catch your sceptical eye. I find you. 

It is you.

I want to get closer to you, place myself within

Until we collide inside

the fire; a fever burning your flesh, your spirit,

but which can never kill you, 

burning through every naked pore with each

hungry kiss. It makes me forget, only if for a moment.

And if none of this is enough I will see you in the next life too.

I have no need to see, no need to breathe

Oh God, Oh Jesus, Oh Satan

Oh, fuck, I don’t know, are they real anymore?

I don’t know, let’s make our own altar here,

in this bed engulfed by flames.

You breathe out your confessions, and I drink 

of your squeezed out pains. You press into me and

I pull you closer into my storm until I taste blood & 

you taste my passion until my wrists swell up.

I could let the world go up in flames. Maybe I’m Ishtar,

the Babylonian goddess of war, sex and blood. 

Maybe I’m Persephone, heart held out in my hand

like that mythical pomegranate. 

Maybe I’m me and you are you

and there is nothing more to it and I should stop

trying to put into words what this feels like-

PARADISE.

But I am a slave to my own writing, 

the words hold me captive, and so I must try.

I ask you why do you love me, you ask me what is love?

I have no choice but to answer. I love that you 

do not pretend to know. At first, to illustrate my answer,

I do not speak but I scream. I scream out in a language unknown

to me; older than Greek, older than Latin, older than Babylonian.

So old it has almost returned to dust. 

I would give up the lofty prospects of heaven 

and salvation one more time if it meant that I would

end up in the same place, here with you. 

I could not ask the heavens for you to have been

there in hell with me, but rather I would beg for them

to have made me stronger, so that I could have fought back

more, if anything, to reach you faster. 

We are alone, and yet together, red threads woven 

as one

and in our loneliness

our souls remain unpurged- 

let us exorcise them now, in this dimming

light. I light a candle for the living, one for the dead

and one for me, separately, as I do not know

to which I belong. A hidden ritual, secret ceremonials,

no more communions of evil remain here.

You tell me the spell is broken, I am no longer there.

I can no longer remain a ghost, haunting the living,

I must regain my flesh and blood, my human life.

You remind me that I am loved, and though I 

may not know the way, 

every day is a new step in the 

right direction, and thus I say to you, “No more!

I am done with blood, I am done with darkness,

I am done with pain!”

and on this winding path the flowers grow in multitudes.

As I exit the church I hear notes flying 

to the ceiling, a violin, a piano, cheering 

up and remembering the dead, the living,

and me. 

I turn my back and withhold a cry

There will never be a brighter moment than this.

I turn back and see 

your hand still in mine. The blossoming trees

sigh with petals, the careless wind blowing

them away now and then. 

A dream of spring I have, for that only 

I wish. It is easy to forget the green hiding 

beneath the grey, the sun concealed between

the clouds.

Finally, as I exit, the god in me awakens

once more, with the spring, with the sun. 

There will be a brighter day than this, in 

time. I remind myself to kiss your lungs,

kiss your breath, which blows me forward. 

And I would stay still, but no walls can

keep me protected from

myself. The heart harbours unimaginable things,

I know. And maybe some things are truly 

meant to last.

They say true love doesn’t hurt but then why

is it that your every touch and your every glance

towards me burns me up? 

Think about it. Somewhere the sun rises up

from the distant horizon, melting into the

orange skies for the 

last time in months. Somewhere Icarus rises out of the sea,

unburned after his desperate reach and fall for 

his one love. Somewhere out there, Lucifer never fell,

and is standing in his rightful place next to his

older brother Michael, untainted. 

What I am saying is that events are, like people,

unpredictable, and oftentimes unchangeable. 

The chance of meeting you was one in 7 billion. 

So what is love? Well, I don’t know. 

I guess it might

be the way I feel when I think about having met

anyone but you. I think maybe it’s how fate rearranged 

itself to have us meet, connected threads

where there were none. It is the way I would do anything 

for you. For just a moment, I do not think, I do not worry.

I am with you, even when I am not with you, 

and you are with me. And if I never find the answer,

at least I know one thing, a paradox

I love you. 

Why do I love you? For every different flower along 

the path, I have a different reason why. 

For every day that you make me want to become 

someone better, and better my demons. For the way

in which you say my name, and for the way I want you to 

say it again and again. For the way you make me laugh 

at everything you say. For the way my words are so rusty

from never being uttered so. For the way my heart skips 

50 beats when you look at me. For the way that you 

make me wish I loved myself too. For the way that your hands

do not suffocate me but let me breathe instead. For the way

that you kiss me. For the way your name suggests home.