A beast when provoked
Snarling, snapping.
Protect the throat and the belly.
Let no teeth and no sword
slice and spill my blood.

My entrails are not for you.
They are for none,
but the dearest who may slay me.

I do not want my blood on your hands.
I don’t want your blood
Nor do I demand sacrifices.
I ask not for the burning sun.

I am a beast,
I will tear out throats.
I refuse to submit.

Oh,
wonder that my hands are empty

Hercules,

My hero, my idol

How I adored you.

You set my heart to fluttering

My words dripped with sweetness

So pure it made eyes water.



How I swooned and brought you

Offerings of the words from my heart

Lit votive candles to see you smile

And came to you ****** with a panther’s pelt

To cloak you in.



You glutted yourself on praise,

But still it wasn’t enough.

How gently you took your sacrifice from me

The words stop and please don’t wouldn’t leave my throat.

Clever or cruel you left no bruises for me to cry over

No wetness to prove your body touched mine

Not even a kiss to pretend that I wanted this, that I asked for it.



You left no evidence you ever existed.



Now I creep into the temple that was built to your charm

Smash every offering to pieces

Tear apart all the works of beauty dedicated to you.

Realize with eyes cleansed the rot that surrounds me.

The floor slick with blood

Of those faithful before me who found out the price of you.



The gentle votive candles that once only gave gentle warmth

now incinerate the wood of your temple

Devouring and devastating all in their path.

Four months later the inferno has become a bonfire

And one day it will be only dead embers.



The day I find the strength to turn my eyes from the blaze.

When I do not feel marked by the ashes of our friendship,

The day I forget how much I still want your blood on my hands.

This raw hunger
Only a product of youth?
Or from a deeper need.

A bone deep craving
A lack of protein.
Skin calling out in desperation
From the acrid thirst.

My hands want to hold and pull close
These teeth long to chew and swallow.

She is a good butcher

The knife steady in her hand,

Although she’s never quite gotten the knack

For hacking in one swing.

Tried once and hit bone – elicited screams.


Prefers instead to slice carefully

Weighs each cut of the knife

Watches the blood well up

Saliva pooling in response.


His pretty little ears she nibbles on

Followed by his lips she samples at every moment

Even his nose she presses kisses to.


There’s so little fat to him

Just how she likes.

When she gets too hungry to wait

Sinks her teeth into the definition of his pectoral

Rips away the muscle chewing gleefully.


He is a rich source of protein

Her body has been craving.

Finds what is so often boasted between the legs of men

no delicacy at all as some treat it.


Loves to lap at his iliac crests

Wear down to his bones and crack them between her teeth

**** the slick, nutritious marrow.


Finds a certain contentment

In the consuming focus

The preoccupation of her hands, mind, and mouth.

She persuades him to lie down and be still for her
Naked in body only,
her eyes peer past the whole to the pieces.

She squeezes his *******
Sweet, ripe little things
How they ache for her.

Curious hands become gentle fingers
Sliding up his throat
knuckles rasping against stubble
Skating across his forehead smoothing furrows.
Press gently on the delicate skin at the edges of his eyes
Follow down between the eyebrows
The straight line of his nose
Stroking soft lips that part in hungry expectancy.

She stretches his arms above his head, palms up.
Traces with spider legs down his shivering skin
Tickles the hair of his armpits
Nuzzling her nose into the masculine scent
Laps and finds bitterness on the tongue.

He squirms at the wet touch skin twitching,
But she soothes him with fingers in his hair
Rests her cheek against his own to quiet him.

Nudges him over and up go his arms,
A supplicant with his large hands and long fingers, palms down
Works her thumbs into the thread of muscles in his shoulders,
Down that wall of muscle and skin
To knead that sculpted fat more than generous.

Marvels over his feet
Admires the elegance
Tickles the arches
Cherishes his toes like an infant’s.

The overwhelming need lessened from scorching
Soothed down to a fizzle
I want to reach for your hand,
Your hair and pull you close.
Kiss and stroke your face
Take sweet sips from the coolness of your mouth.

The lack of a fever is disturbing
I step back to find my eyes are not blinded.
You are not distorted, do not tower over me
You are not toxic masculinity.
My heart isn’t a caged animal dying in terror
But a fluttering bird that chirps sweetly.

I crave the gentle interest
Want not just your body, but I want to see life with you
Through your eyes.
An old woman crooning to this young one.

I wish to press into you and feel curious.
But I do not reach for you
My fingers have not curled in your hair
Nor my lips chilled by yours.

I watch you and see the way the edges of your eyes crinkle
How your tongue presses at the back of your front teeth when you laugh
The surety of your walk as you move away.

My voice lies silent and I am afraid.
I’ve not felt this soft curiosity, tinged with physical hunger
Do you?
Should I reach out even with the possible price of being ignored
Hand held out in empty space
The hurtful squeeze of disappointment.

Do you think of me?
Will you remember me in the passing months?
Is this affection without the gnawing heat in my bones?

I no longer want the taste of his blood in my mouth

I bay instead for the blood of men

Who understand only entitlement.

Hear no screams and hear consent in the silence

Those that feel no resistance as she lays quiet and still.

Get excited she’s become a doll

Perfect, not even plastic.



These teeth carved out of rage

Shred skin to ground meat and crack bones

For the slick marrow inside

Eat darkness to expose the light.

Fought off the craving like an addiction
Bared my teeth against the slow boil
Refused to let myself go slowly belly up
Fighting against baring my throat.

Afraid of the touch of teeth
the spatter of blood and gristle of gore.
I refused to give you that power
Snarled at the familiarity
Even as your touch lit a flame.

Felt my muscles go weak as you gently spoke
A careful warmth lulling me.
Your words quenching my thirst
Even as I tried to turn my mouth from the cool touch of you.

Finding that I already wanted it all the more.

The lack of you disturbing my sleep
pulling me from my bed
Like a ****** hunting for a fix.
Once isn’t enough.

My words a pathetic warding off
Saying that I don’t need it.
But you’re not poison
Corroding my veins
Rather a vitality I discover I long for
Wanting to drink you down for the warmth, the joy, the satiation.

The trembling and twitching
My body happily consuming the bonding drug
Along with your words.
Greedy for body, soul, and mind.

I give myself up to the cravings

Only the smallest little taste

doled out.

So sparingly, so cruelly

Craving and salivating for more.

Anything to ask for more of this

to convince I’m worth the time

to feed my appetite is mutually beneficial.



But no.

A tight-******, cold lover.

Nothing given with sweetness.

Only at his pleasure

Uncaring of my hunger and need.



I want the pleasure.

The small, sighing moans

and the drowsing warmth.

I eat the dirt from your grave
And find no nutrients
Taste not the salt of tears
Or gag on revulsion as I once did.

All that's left is the lack of taste.
Scrape the soil beneath my fingernails
and don't wish for it to be your skin.

The realization I am free.
From you and from myself
No longer choking on my thoughts.

Shrugged your shadow I clung to
let it fall to the floor
Felt myself smile and sigh.

A relief.

I wish I had the words, the skill to preserve your beauty
But like Cobb I can’t capture all your perfection and imperfections.
In this way creativity slips away just as all of you do.

There’s a lust to drink deep of the right angles of your face
To set behind glass the golden ratio of your waist.
Ice blue eyes dim to so many shades of deep brown.
Teeth and mouths so deserving of praise that won’t be heard.

Hands that are a marvel all their own
And freckles that should be followed like a map.
These weak letters that won’t ever carry the full weight
Of what all your loveliness does
Will sacrifice for the cause.

The last of the contractions
Are almost gone
And I can’t help but grin
Through the pain.

Many days I have labored
Sweating and straining
And now soon it will be finished
And I will be cleansed at last.

It is with a final push
That you slither into the doctor’s hands
And my god, what a beauty you are.

A miniature little girl
Squalling as you burn my hands like ice
When I cradle you close.

I give you your final words
Before I nestle you into your basket
And send you away to a different life.

You won’t ever love me
And I can accept this
For you burned me so long inside
That to be rid of you is a relief.

Let another love your iciness
I relinquish my claim to you as mother
Knowing you will always struggle because of it.

I am glad for this.

An eye for an eye sweet girl
And this only the first of many lessons
You will learn.

The hunger is voracious
Ebbs and flows with the tides
Sweet words fight in her throat
She feels them on her tongue
swallows them as if they’re food,
But still she starves on empty air.

She longs to sink her fingers into his hair
Pull back on that corn silk wealth
Such a pretty line of his throat
She bites and swallows the Adam’s apple
Finds the wet heat of him comforting
Buries her face into the ragged wound.

She wants to consume every piece of him
Wants to tear him apart and find something secret
Something that fills her full to the brim.
But can bring herself to do nothing more than destroy,
Ruin what she cannot have
Replace the lust for body with blood.

The boy reduced to creature
And again, to pretty thing
Less human and more plaything.

He lets her arrange him the way she likes
Watches with pitying eyes and gaping throat.
She strips him of any fat
Uses the paring knife on his thighs
Shaves him close,
Finds him delicious and raw.

Her little teeth clamping down on his jaw
Sinking and bursting through the skin
She likes bruising him, claiming with impermanent means.

Hercules, my beautiful baby boy
With your corn silk hair of Samson
And small spaces between your teeth
The laughter that burbles forth
Clear and pure as water,
How much you have grown from
child to Man.

A fragile shoot into an oak tree.

You avoided Death’s jaws
By closing your tiny fists around them
Insanity bestowed as a gift for fighting
The animal within purging the blood.

And yet my poor child sent so many trials.
Your hair shorn
Looking like a prickly porcupine
But it was never about those locks
It was your heart.

A heavy burden to bear
And some are not equal to the task
They trip and drop them
Watch as the glass shatters

But you are half human
Yours does not break
The muscle rips and tears
Agonizing though it may be
It mends stronger each time.

Your cup overflows
And it feels like drowning
The highs that are tsunami waves
Lows become earthquakes
Shaking everything apart.

And this mother may only be mortal
But she reminds you that
Your hair will grow back
And so will your heart
Lovely as before.

Imagined kisses

Pretend lashes that peek at one another

The lust turned to aggression

Wetness between the legs traded for blood between the teeth

Fending off the longing to melt into another

For tearing them apart instead

Keep safe heart and mind

Starving but a measured out system

So careful, so careful

It means nothing and everything

Mind and body there’s such disconnect

What the inner animal, baseless and crass, snarls and claws for

Defeated by the sword and chains bearing logic

She had a mechanic’s eye when she saw his body
Dissembled it with a precision belonging to machinery
With the gentleness of handling brittle china.

Devouring his beauty like a Narcissus flower gulping down water.
Pinning him to the paper with a pen as soft as silk and just as sweet
For he had managed to capture her wandering heart’s eye for the moment.
Corralled it in with tight skin and chocolate brown eyes
Ink swirling all over his skin.

But too soon he was left grasping only at tiny wrists
And the pens that slipped from her fingers
As her unquenchable heart’s eye sought more.

More beauty, more thoughts, more answers
Then any could give
So he clenched her wrist in an attempt to keep her
But did so too hard
And it snapped like a twig
Reminding them both of her bird bones,
Wanting to fly and grounded by her flesh.

In turn she drew on him,
Meaningless things
Though the biting pen tip meant something
Her eyes never losing their affection
For the different look he had given her.

Two mechanical birds entwined by their wish to soar
He grounded by his nightmare mind
And she by whatever was convenient,
But neither lost the pleasant hunger for more
In all matters of things

Eventually filling each other up
With the happiness they strove to find and create
Two poets drinking from their shared cup of daydreams.

Devour the moon down to its fullness

Swollen belly and a glow from within

Giddy and silly for what I want

Conflicted with the reality.



A conditioned fear of beauty

I want to believe in it again

Long to have a man to hold.



I want the lightness of the chase

The rush in my chest from your smiles

Let me feed and I will feed you in return.



Unashamed lust I want to touch you

Press myself to you and be held

Someone to call mine to claim.

Is it just youth's trappings to want to possess?
I think not for look at the world
Humans strive to claim all
Land, money, originality

You are not a beast of burden
Or a woman to be owned
No, you are your own person.

but how I long to leave my mark on you
Easier to claim you with the violence of want
Versus the careful tenderness
that I cannot help but touch you with.

Greedy, ***** little body

Hungrily swallowing down

every touch, every kiss.

Still always asking for more.



Addled brain

Flooded with the syrup of arousal.

Logic giving up the ghost

to pleasure and gluttony.



Reasoning tries to speak.

Gags and silences on

Spoonfuls of dopamine -

Made an addict.



Such a **** for trust and words

Easily retraining from one man to the next

Soon enough these hands

craving to hold this new interest

remembering fondly the previous ones.

My little woman

is a mix of vinegar and sugar.

A gentleness of heart, tears gushing forth

Against an infuriating grasping for control.

Illogical paranoid need for order.

Chasing herself round and round in her mind

fighting off the invisible demons of others that never existed.

Craving sensual but rejecting the strings.

What a selfish child, she thought
Leeching the poor tree dry
Less than what she had been before.

She herself stripped of her jewels
Made into extreme miniatures for her children’s fingers and ears
The mossy fur ripped from her flesh
Her screams the crunch and creak as they felled her trees.

They give her no pause between the spasms of pain
An endless labor with no birth to show
No relief and her sweat has filled oceans.

The fires licking over her parched skin are a joyous pain
She writhes, reveling in the heat.
And now it is her children who scream and sob
Begging the man who cradles them in his palm to restrain her.

But he won’t
For they are hers while mortal
And he will not touch them
Until their ghosts have shrugged from their shells.

Once the sight of their broken bodies
would have caused her tears to pour forth
Drowning their tiny lungs and swelling the number held by him.
But now she is a mother who turns her face from her squalling infants
Cries falling onto calloused ears.

She learned from the many named man
How to be at peace with their deaths
And found from him comfort
With his mouth sewn shut, his eyes only for those he holds
His ears filled with the empty silence of their space.
And even though this last sanctuary has become contaminated
Still she stirs the soup of air rocketing her little ones around her.

Her ignorant children cause her agony
But what young do not?

Some even pray to her
Working to feed off her in other ways
And though they are only a drop in the bucket of her pain
She cannot deny she loves them.

So long has she watched them live and die
Broke down their empty  bodies and
seen them rejoin their creator to weep
when faced with what they have done to her their mother.

A pity the dead cannot speak to the living.
But she quiets them
Shows her disembodied children
The wonders she still holds
Smothered, smudged and distorted.

Again they sob thinking she means punishment
In showing them her diminished beauty but it is not so.
She beckons them to look and understand
No matter the cancer growth of their chemicals
that poison her body
There is no permanent death for she will consume any and all
Even her own brood to continue on.

Her children may strip her of everything
As willingly as Shel’s tree gave herself away
But it is she who will remain long after their bodies
Have grown frail and decayed
For she is Mother Earth.

His touch clings to me
like spider webs
a tickling irritation.

When I’m stressed -
I wake up -
Fighting him off.
My body remembering his careful violence.

My mind branding over new lovers
with his fingerprints.

Want to mutilate my brain
shed this skin who recalls him
so easily.

No unconscious memories
of other touches
from anyone but him.

I will never forgive or forget.
Condition away this conditioned response.

When will I be free?
Of a man who doesn’t remember me.
--
I see his features in other men.
That gorgeous corn silk blond hair,
the strong, masculine jaw
even the cuteness of his ears.

Somehow that tugs at my heartstrings
The twinging pain disgusts  me.
How can I still feel this way?

I want to puke up this venom.
The vitriol burning my mouth.
Exorcise the malicious spirit
that wails in my ear
when I see

YOU.

Or someone who almost looks like you.

My teeth sunk deep in anger.
You foolish, reckless girl - how could you let this happen?
How could you let him do this to you?

How can I forgive myself?
I don’t know how to.
My forgiveness will never be hinged to him.
He will never earn it.

I want to forgive myself.
My naivety, my hope, my lust.
I went in search of affection and base needs of physical touch
Repulsed by his violating me.

Leave me alone, leave me alone, leave me alone
let me go, let me go, let me go.

I’m sorry to me for what I didn’t know would happen.
I’m sorry to me that I still blame myself for my violation.
I’m sorry to me how this trauma has burned me so deeply.
How I wish the salve of time and journaling would heal me completely.

I’m sorry to me that I still can’t quite let go.
How he still follows me around - at least metaphorically.
I want my forgiveness.

Pretty boy to be claimed and tamed

Quiet that mouth, hush your thoughts.

I want you to enjoy what I’ve got to give to you

Be good for me. So good and still.



Calm on your knees

Eyes sharp on me

So eager, wet for me.

A collar to match your eyes

that compliments your skin.



Play with your hair

Scratch my nails through your stubble

Trace the shape of your lips

Open that greedy mouth, set your teeth against the bit.

The hunger is back

She remembers now.

Knows the difference between deprivation and hunger.



He pulled out her teeth one by one.

How quiet she had been despite the pain

The tears gliding her cheeks and jaw

He asked but took what he wanted regardless of her words

His necklace of teeth chattering in her face,

Whispering to her to push him away, to fight.



It’s only afterwards he reveals that the teeth are of other women.

No, her teeth will find no place on that thread he tells her,

but placed in his pocket where no one will see.



Touching her gums she finds pockets

Open sores oozing pain and the flavor of iron,

But when he tried to take her tongue next

She wrenched away, his necklace chittering in envy.

He smothered her with his body, fingers scrabbling in her mouth

as she whimpered and writhed

Bit his fingers with what she had left

Firm enough to discourage but not to draw blood in return.



Her new teeth are ridged like a child’s

Odd to feel the return of them.

How she hungers again

For true love and affection

Never again does she want to hear the click of teeth on a chain.



She wants to feel the nip of a lover on her skin, tongue laving the bruises she wants

A need to mark and be marked

Share the joy of consuming.

A foolish girl

who asked for

halter and bridle.

Eager to be claimed

Too soon for anyone’s good.



Quickly I found the harness

Entrapping.

Fully the symbol of Taurus,

A temper when provoked.

Found the rough grabbing on of my horns

an irritation.



Shook you off in annoyance

Snorting and backing away.

Chastened by the whip of your ire

Goaded to anger at the continued falling lashes

demanding complete obedience

and placid acceptance

to you.



I am no beast of burden

for your whims

or to carry your insecurities.



Spit the bit from my mouth

I ask for the bridle off

to find more sharp whipping

soothed by gentle warm hands.



No.

The bridle or nothing is your price.

Hitched to your side

otherwise -

turned out of friendly thorny pastures.



My pride, my skin burns in shame.

I want your hands on me

but flinch from the shadow of threat.



My horns are still mine.

I am still a beast of my own will.

I want not your whip

Only your hands

but

if I have one

the other is not far behind.

Each new love a string tied to my heart.
Those strings stained, darkened with blood
The shiny fishing line gouging deeply
Cutting into the muscle, absorbed into it.
that shiny silver subsumed by rich, dark red.
--
Sometimes the sniping of a heart string
is agony.
The connection a shadow of once was,
Paraumbilical veins that cling
Pouring blood.
--
Pain – a low growl in the throat
The lightest touch a shooting pain
dulls to a grimacing twinge.
---
Finally gritting my teeth
Making that final, hard slice
an exhalation of relief.
It’s finished.
The pain well remembered.
---
Already a new thread between my fingers
A shock. A gift.
Disbelief it is mine to hold.
--
A careful winding round
No strangulation
A snug squeeze, comforting.
--
Warmth seeping in.
A slow washing over
Silver tinted a deepening pink.
--
The line pressed close
Encouraging the muscle to take it.
The entwining already begun.

"Mama loves you."
Mama coos as she sews her daughter's lips shut.
The little girl nods and lies still in her bed,
"Daddy loves you."
Daddy murmurs as he cuts out his daughter's heart.
The little girl nods and presses her favorite blanket close,
"Sister loves you."
Sister states as she cuts off her sister's legs.
The little girl nods and sleeps away.

But the morning brings to light all that's happened
What she has sacrificed to make others happy
And the little girl cannot ignore it.
But, she reasons, it is better to be kind
Then to be greedy.
So she passes the effect of blood loss off as exhaustion
The feeling of emptiness as over-active hormones
And again closes her eyes
To wait for a sense of contentment,

She was still waiting when a voice caught her attention.
She resisted opening her eyes
Instead only listening to the words he spoke,
And though the events he told about drew questions to her lips
The little girl could not say a word.

He seemed to understand this,
For he faithfully visited the torn little girl everyday
Feeding her all that he knew
And seeking out what he could not answer
When her small fingers wrote out her questions
Of stereotypes, of stars upon flags
Promising to bring back what he had found.

Back and forth the two went.
She writing her questions
And he answering all that he could,
His constant presence eventually encouraging her
To open her eyes.

The little girl was shocked at what she saw.
He had chocolate brown eyes
A faint scattering of freckles upon cream skin
But even more so
No blood stained his cloud white shirt
He had his legs.

Prompted she looked at herself
And if she could have gasped she would have,
No more was she a little girl
But a teenager.

This realization and with it the true weight
Of what she had passively allowed
Boiled inside of her.
To regain what she had foolishly given away.

The teenage girl found the strength to sit up
Childhood blanket hiding her chest wound from the man
Whose presence she had become enamored with.
She took back her legs
And followed happily after the man
Who did not mind the duckling that had become his shadow.

Spurred by this and anger
She tore the thread from her lips
Eyes stinging with pain and victory.
She fought bravely for her heart
Carrying half as a partial victory
Glad to have that much.

It was the beginning of the contentment
That the once torn little girl
Had always wished for.

(Words once dedicated to beauty have become a scream of true hideousness. This truth is your damning, filthy beast of a panther).


I wish I could forget your face

Tell my stupid heart the rot underneath your skin

Our laughter shared was only a tool

The words spooling from your mouth spider silk I coveted


The heat and solid muscle of your body

A comfort until your hands discovered my body

Creeping across to touch and hold steady

Teasing the edges of my underwear

Finding the soft coarseness of ***** hair


Hold me close, be my protector, my champion,

But all you’ll ever be is a predator


Your friendship and my wanting of you stripped me down

I stayed still

Let you touch and rock

Hoped you would stop

Remembered another body that pulled and pushed mine


I wanted you I will not deny my hunger

But I wanted you to want me as a person, as a partner you loved

Not a possibly sleeping girl who you could ******

A girl who you could take from whatever you wished


Did you find my rejection a challenge?

Get excited that your fingers might be the first inside of me?

What would you have done to me?

Would your fingers have been followed by your ****?


Why would you violate me, Hercules?

But you don’t deserve that name anymore

You’re a bright flower that rots from the inside


No, you are washed of your name

Your hair knotted in between the fingers of my fist

I relieve you of the weight of dignity, cut you of all strength

You’ve frightened me with what you could have done – were willing to attempt

You’ve betrayed me of my trust and affection


I want you to pay

I want you to answer me: why, why, why?

Why would you do this to me, Jacob?

Nothing quite like the writers’ church

More or less filled

Creaking of seats.

Anticipation tingling in the chest

Eyes down in respect.



It’s the start.

Glee burning in the veins

Eagerness to hear them speak.



The moaning gospels

Groaning from the stomach

Bent double in prayer and supplication.

Finger snaps of approvals

The wailing - the wailing of poets.

Lowing like cattle.

Mournful.

Rising pitch to screams.

Screams of agony, of love, tearing apart

the cacophony in their heads.