surfacedfox

MONSTER FLESH

To skin and bone it brushes close,
a livery of slayer's coats.

Horns that make a freakish tower.
Which gaze is now a squire's glower?

That clack and clatter of tooth and claw,
a sound that mocks their natural law.

This spiny tail wrapped around,
too much of me trails on the ground.

Call not it fear but shrieking horror,
but lies upon a fair knight's honour.

To veil a coat of glitt'ring scales,
that bite at souls whom age entails.

Mortality in mirror's sheen,
my body's been the fears unseen.

So paladin in armoured stride,
he rips my wings with bittered pride.

Then fingers run through wilded curls,
the skull beneath as scalp unfurls.

How much for hate, how much desire?
A naked carcass on the pyre.

I feel their touch, caress, and brush.
A shattered veil across my bust.

They grope at teat, fat thigh and arm.
Could I dare say that these are mine?

And those who claim a close embrace,
how quick to turn on lack of grace.

Obsessed gnash at hiding sex,
the fucking cock between my legs.

That heart of blood and rotting mess,
the stirring of a monster's flesh.

The distant light of torches burn,
now far from snakes among the ferns.

Where muddy wounds leave bloody trail,
of river red with severed tail.

In burrow deep of lizard bone,
the dead that lurk as part of home.

How many kin not let survive,
I see them still through haunted eyes.

Would none but shadows be my own,
at least with them I'm not alone.

~ Cailín Grace Brown