i trip-stumble back (fall back fall back)

back/back/back to the beginning

i should have snared you in grade school

strapped you to the hood of my car

and driven off a cliff into the sunset

(where we implode)



palms out/groping/reaching/starved through with desperation

to lift this mask to open this casing and go on to the next

layers keeping me warm-warm sweet and still in the grey place

/as the cobwebs kiss and caress/

and force me to contemplate the forever

the horror of asphodel when compared to the palace

(bar me/bid me/banish me/leave my remains to rot and escape the vault of heaven)



the lies of golden fireflies and flowers that taste of chalk and dust

my feet--stitched through the floor

with threads withstanding time

standing in the same place i heaved and gasped

two years (two days) and three forevers ago

when the world tilted under my feet and the madness crept into my bones unnoticed

and you ran

ran ran ran like the wind

because you conjured the UnderQueen

and the demon of life kicked my ribs for all my breath

i've occupied myself since inventing aliases, brandishing swords, killing kin, diving off precipices, and bursting into flames

until my lungs stayed flat



under the gelid stagnant water, i lurk

leave me to the maggots and fishes the sidling crocodiles and spooky moss

i prefer a bed of mud and companions cold

where the sediment slowly takes the place of tissue and cartilege

but you won't let me rest--won't let me sleep--haunt and infect

you cast your potions and circles and summon up some demon to torture that once dandled me on his knee and expect to win my trust

and what you summon up is Truth, fierce and primal and impassioned to fire and fury



your title meant witchhunter

let's face it

there was only ever one Witch you sought

who could dodge bullets and free mandibles with a barefist

who could merge with trees and take lethal blows and bounce on

who came with an entourage of demons and angels and fallen and worse

who could resurrect the dead and summon the damned

who fed on blood and sex and soul

and answered to no one--not even her creator



/and for Her/

you'd gnaw through your restraints

you'd rip the bindings and if you had to Blind yourself

you would go through ice and fire and the belly of the beast

straight through the ranks of wraiths and damned

to the ends of the earth

.stop.at.nothing.      .stop.at.nothing.   .stop.at.nothing.



(i remember this)

but it does nothing for my illness

than make me restless

--listless and livid, starving and irrational--

clear enough to sink my claws in for more than two minutes

(you promised--you promised--and now i'll eat your liver--now you'll never forget it)

(i was your Goddess--do you regret it--do you regret it)

here in the grey place

:alone:

but not untouched

i stare at the coloured ice and hum

so sick of this overpaid novacaine serenade for the razorblade deserving

and poke my finger at the dust at my feet

--honourable monsters and only daughter--

the wind shifts, i hiss/plagiarist/

twist eagerly toward the door

i should have eaten your pretty bones so long ago

(because now i am incapable of surviving on my own)

my love for you rips me apart

call forth the necromancers and wolves

i seem to have dropped my joints all over the place

and those need to be in place before ever we worry

about

/the condition of skin/

or

/the futility of my beast-heart/

or

/the status of my brain and a hope for the future/



but soon:

up comes the Phoenix

/singing/