battleground – when the walls finally split open shadows spill like blood from a vein in heaven, thick and pulsing.
i claw at the air— but it moves faster— my prince, locked in its sight.
Grief uncoils, a creature made from every night I didn’t die, every scream i swallowed until it soured in my throat.
it lunges, and i meet it with my bare hands—
ripping, cursing, howling like an animal who has learned too late that love is not armor, only kindling.
i am fire and pleading. i am mother and meat.
i am every name Grief has ever whispered before it fed.
my eyes flick up and meet their mirror, tears dew along the rim.
“mama—” i choke, voice splintering.
“always— comes— for you—”
the Beast bites through my ribs.
i whisper through blood,
"always have—”
it swallows the sound, my lungs, my name—
“always will.”
the world contracts. my body splits like a prayer denied.
light hemorrhages. memory convulses.
his laughter flickers, stutters, dims—
until only the sound of feeding remains.
