Prt one.
There is a beast beneath my skin,
Her hunger always grows within.
She claws and tears with savage grace,
Until I scarcely know my face.
She paces through my hollow chest,
A creature robbed of peace and rest.
Her teeth are carved from grief and flame,
Yet no one ever speaks her name.
She howls against my brittle bones,
A voice that rattles through the stones.
She scratches at my fragile cage,
A prisoner consumed by rage.
She rends the silence, thin and frail,
With sharpened claws that never fail.
Each heartbeat pounds like iron drums,
Foretelling all that I’ve become.
Her talons carve through flesh and vein,
Inscribing every buried pain.
She feeds upon the words unsaid,
Then builds her nest inside my head.
I lock the door. She finds the key.
She wears my face. She breathes through me.
I bite my tongue. I stand up straight.
She only learns to imitate.
She prowls the halls my soul once knew,
Leaving nothing pure or true.
She drinks the light from every room,
Then crowns the silence into doom.
She does not sleep. She does not tire.
She tends an everlasting fire.
She licks the ash from every prayer,
Then leaves the smoke to fill the air.
So if you say I look composed,
Know every wound is neatly closed.
For monsters need no blood to feed—
They only need
a heart
that forever bleeds.
