P- pages torn from books coated in prophesies  
R- razor blades slice through memories
O- open wounds drip crimson blood upon chalk stars
P- pen drawn runes coat your skin drawn in black ink
H- haloed in holy fire angels descended with knife blade wings
E- eyes gunmetal grey rimmed with puffy red highlights
T- they call you proclaimer, gods words carved into your bones.

/'mad-nes/
noun
1. I forgot I had fists today. my heart decided to be a warrior. punch after punch, does it seek glory?  I’m washing my hands; they shine like red sunsets when I first found paradise.
Am I a murderer? or did I **** my thoughts in self defence?

2. angels are talking behind my ear. they don't sound like the cruel laughter i know but they never leave (everyone always does) should i call this love a lie? for the first time I think I could be holy.
I almost smile.

3. my lips are full of crimson coated lies. As I dance in forgotten light, I pour a trail of gasoline, yesterday I tried to burn my mind, I left three bodies fading behind my back (all were mine mine mine) forgive me father for leaving those marks. mother says heaven doesn't want me anymore.

Ik/sting(k)SH(a)n/
noun
1. ultraviolet silence. fracture patterns in the exposed knuckle bones. we pray with our knees in the dust but the gods do not answer us. the pines creak with the weight of ghosts.
2. it is a fire light dance. it is a marrow-born dance. close your tired eyes. let yourself be spun in winding circles. remember to breathe, remember to breathe.
3. no red feathers, all red ashes. listen to me, child, it always starts with you saying, I am doing something right.

/gref/
noun
1. the pain says, i have come for you, and you say, you are too blinding, I don't want to look.

2. your chest is a wall of fire. the pain says, I own buckets, and I own torches. you pick torches.

3. your soul is a wall of thorns. the pain says, what can I do for you? you say, nothing. this is dream from which I know I will wake.

4. your heart is a wall of storm clouds. the pain says, I will lend you my shoulders and my hands. you say, I don't have strength in me to touch anyone yet.

5. life shivers, melts, moves on. the pain says, I have come for you, and you look upon it and say, yes, I’ve kept you waiting too long.

/ dev/ i /steijn/
noun
1. shadows wreak havoc under an oil-black sky. what once was a gemstone of a city, shrouded in a film of dust & decay. i linger in the aftermath of a bomb-swollen storm. a thousand babies are buried beneath the ruins, wailing for mothers long gone.
2. war is a plague. i see more and more phantoms with eyes like the void, haunting the streets after twilight. an orchestra of bullets patter on my window, sliding down the glass like rain.
3. the emptiness of my home was a lot to bear. but when they set it ablaze, i salvaged my soul from the ashes.

/ka / THär / sis/
noun
1. your head pounds. your heart pounds. your fists pound a bag of sand, over and over, again again again, and you hear bones crack that are not your own. the crimson blood on your knuckles is no less satisfying than if it were his.
2. the end of the year brings a summer bonfire with all your classmates. the faces blur together with one too many beers. you throw back your head and yell like a banshee, like a wild thing. I am free now, your scream says. your classmates howl with you and their earth-shattering chorus of no more goes on for miles.
3. poetry, photography, acrylic paint, short stories. you create everything you can to escape the destruction you left behind.

/pes/ti/lince/
noun
1. we are little gods unto ourselves. locust-eaters, fire-bleeders, laughing wicked boys with figs in our pockets and honey-stained mouths. we ride on our white horses through villages that will be nothing but the ashes of the sick once we leave.
2. our laughter tastes like victory. you can't help but stare, we look so holy glowing in the light. go on, tell us how we are beautiful, ghost- like, how our skin reeks of thunder, how you make love to us and feel your body turning inside out with fever. how you are so hungry to give up your soul one sickness at a time. go on, surrender.
3. we wear crowns given, not taken. take life instead of giving it. we sweep through villages like contagion, and we always conquer. conquer, conquer.
goddess

/'god / es/
noun
1. you know what it is to be holy. deep veins filled with ichor ache for wounds the earth feels, lightning storms and hurricane pain walking hand in hand across a ground you helped design. the thousand voices that scream your name in both battle chant and song. their lives are not a game but you play anyway.
2. you are sharp edged steel. a lone fragment of a shattered mirror, the broken bone reflection of a cruel smile. all that you are is ripped edges and cracked glass but your heart still throbs with lioness blood.
3. ichor drips from your fingertips, gold glistens on your lips. you took to power like Icarus took to the sky and you know your fall will be just as sweet.


ache
/a k/
noun
1. heavy wind, cold rain, & yes the stars, & yes these hands of mine. a dream in my chest is melting. my dream sheds its muddy, thunder-stained skin & asks for a heart of peony fields this time.
2. & the nights get heavy like they always do. i am older which means when i think of forests i get stuck not on the robin eggs but on the fox teeth. in my head I am hunting for myself, but I come up empty again. the night grows so wide it could be a cavern & i am somewhere underneath it, inside it, lost. but travellers always leave lanterns behind & as i feel for the candle there arrives a memory of bronze-coloured light.
3. so i dream, i dream, i keep dreaming. one word in my mouth crystallizes like sugar: hope.