Apocalypse

The world ends, drowned in streetlights and shadows, in terror and the terrible beauty of light. You stand on the cracked roads, and your wings have lent fear to your mortal legs. You throw yourself at the sky as I did at the last bridge. But there's no rope tying you to now, no rubber cord to save you from the grinning maw, no red cord tying you to my side. You fly until the jagged edges of the city bite into the heaven, until the golden rim of dawn sinks into the bubbling miasma of the sea, until the false light of the moon grows dim and cold. And you are flying still, while I stand beneath the curved halls of the sky.

The road you stood on has cracked and crumbled, and I cannot (will not) follow. As I watch for you, I pray that the streaks of fire falling from the skies are only your tears.

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The end of days is a lonely place, but I get by. Hearts are for sale, cheaper than hope. I can't blame them. The sellers are cold, and no one wants to die alone. But I'm here, and I stand. And the city, cracked open, is a wonderful provider, even better when there were such things as homes and rules. Small but strong, you used to tease me. You needed me as I never needed you, someone who believed in you and your message. And I survive.

The end of days is a lonely place.

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The ones with those to protect die first.I grow to despise widows and their sad-eyed children. There's a yearning in them that I hate. They hunger, as all of us do, but it's the hunger of children that has no place in this (what's left of this) world.

As we beasts scavenge and tear into the wreckage of their lives, their warm glowing hearts drip bloody tears. Around us cities dissolve into black smoke and deep gray sighs. We wash them down, every bit of them, with every drop of our own bitterness.

But we live for another day.

Mouth glistening and curved, wet and red, I look to the sky. Are you there, protected by the shelter of your wings? By the airy halls of heaven? My smile is an obscene thing to the white purity of the dead. But I intend to live. You're no longer here, and (but) I intend to survive.

The end of days is a lonely place, but I will survive. While angels and devils shriek as Hell and Heaven alike oust them from their roosts, tumbling into nonexistence.

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Red sky at night, sailor's delight. But no one's going home, because the whole world is our home.

And it's nothing but an empty shell, thin rock wrapped around a core gone dead and cold. The sun is a red eye, baleful with God's judgment. We stare back, unblinking. There is no fear left, not since we saw the blackened corpses of cherubs stripped of their wings. Nothing left to fear, nothing left to fight. The four horsemen have gorged themselves into starvation. Lucifer's still stuck downstairs and always will be. But for whatever its worth, we're still here. And we're not going to cough up the seeds we swallowed, no we're not.

And so we fight, and sit and stare unblinking, handing our judgment to the gods who created this world in a fit of bored experimentation.

Perhaps you are here with me. Wings wrapped around me, protective. But I can't feel anymore, and your wings are nothing but so much spun light, weightless, helpless, useless. I am burning alive, and you, the memory of you, all that you were and that's left, is burning along with me.

Aeons collapse into dust, and we fall with them.

And as the sun implodes and everything turns to so much ash scattered across the cold comfort of the places beyond Hell and Heaven, I'll still think of you and your pearl iridescence as you fly in fear.

I love you.

I need you.

I can never forgive you.