I don't know if there's a God but sometimes I want so desperately to believe He exists. Not a kind and loving God, nor a cruel and wrathful one. A fair God; a just God. A God who will strip me of these unnecessary fetters, cloth and flesh and muscle, and judge the essence of the soul beneath. I don't trust a mere mortal mind to weigh the burdens of ( Read more... )

“Carpal Tunnel”

fingers cramp and ache
numbness crawling along nerves
sinking into bones
a slow creep from hand to heart
insidious apathy

They say you're born this way, that it's not a sickness, not a fault, just part of who you are. Something natural and beautiful. But they aren't the ones who have to live with it; they aren't the ones who were never given a choice. How can they possibly understand what it's like to desire something so perverse, so filthy? How dare they act as if ( Read more... )

Tanim edged up the darkened stairwell, the wooden steps polished to a dangerous sheen by hundreds of years of passing feet. At the top of the stairs he stopped and drew in a slow, calming breath, allowed himself a moment to gather his thoughts. No sense going in with his nerves already wound tight; he needed to remain clear headed or he wouldn't be ( Read more... )

“Do you know how many times I've died?” A long drag on the cigarette can't mask the trembling of his hand, nor the acrid smoke disguise the sneer twisting his mouth. “How many times I've been torn to pieces? Beaten? Burned? Raped?” He draws again on the cigarette. The embers spark a brief light in his eyes but fail to warm his frozen gaze. “I can' ( Read more... )

My poor lover is so thin skinned, so quick to bruise and bleed. Words cut him to the bone and leave wounds which tear open again at the slightest provocation. He doesn't have the armor of apathy and disdain that I do. Where I can turn my back on the hurled insults, the cruel whispers and spiteful glares, each one lands a fresh blow on his ( Read more... )

“Don't do it,”

“What?”

“Check the time,” Tanim glanced up from the stack of paperwork spread across the desk between them just as Daren began to roll his shirt cuff back to uncover his watch. “It'll only depress you.” The warning came too late, however, and the younger man groaned theatrically. “Oh, fuck me. You've got to be kidding. And here I ( Read more... )

You dare threaten us with the gallows? With the lash and the pyre? Don't make me laugh. We aren't afraid of any punishment or death you could meter out. Justice and fairness are a load of bullshit anyway; faith and hope are useless comforts. We expect nothing less. It's truth that will protect us in the end. Even suffocating on our own blood, we' ( Read more... )

“Prism”

like light refracted
so emotions are diffused
a rainbow scatter
grief and rage, loathing and spite
the hues of unhappiness

“I would throw it all away for you,” he swears, casting his hand out to encompass not this dingy motel room but all the unseen world passing us by beyond its walls: home and family, wealth and security, decadence and influence anyone would envy. Yet even as he gestures the ring glitters on his finger, bright and meaningless as his words. In that ( Read more... )