THE BEAST

by Matthew Roy

Creature.

A being wrought

begotten dreamed into

existence in a calamitous world

more insidious than the serpent

that tempted Eve in the Garden

cowled Lucifer

sloughing off dead shell and luster

smote by the Lord

an angel without sheen

Morning Sun and

mourning sun

deterioration

undoing

reckoning

Something brutal, chthonic

Even now an eel slithers beneath

an oily surface

on a moonless night

a thing that has never know the sun

except

as a distant and white orb

cold

shimmering

above its hunting grounds

What promises does the Beast make to you?

He lurks

inside you and me

barely contained

He has been waiting

What motives does He prey upon?

What incestuous wishes do you pray upon?

What sort of desolate gods permit such blasphemy?

He is ruin. He is revelation.

He is you. He is me.

Some separate yet essential part

The Beast suffers and so must the world

and all who are a part of it

and all in Heaven above

who think themselves beyond

such petty concerns

ashes to ashes

we all fall down