Work Text:
That Dead Men Rise Up (Never)
This time there was no chariot,
No gaping maw in ravished earth,
Just the silent grave,
Your pieced and piercéd flesh and
The lamentation of the boy who called you
Brother.
Below, there was none of
The simplicity of storybook apples.
They offered, instead, a fruit far older.
It stained your fingers, your teeth,
Rooted itself into your soul
To bind you to Hell's heart itself,
To open you from the inside out
Until you were nothing but meat and malice,
A creature halfway to their making.
We stormed the heat and hatred,
Sword-bright and sharp and found
You smeared and bleared in sin but still,
Even still I could see your soul-light shining.
I held you close and found each seed
Beneath your bloodied tongue,
Sucked and sipped their
Bitter weight from the corners
Of your pomegranate mouth
Until all that was left
Was the taste of a man broken
But yet beautiful.
I held you close and raised your rooted soul
Through fire and night to lay you down again
Into the hollows of your shattered bones,
Bade you bloom again with only
The taste of clear skies,
Cool waters,
And the sharp, bright bite of apples,
Whose seeds you could spit into
Your broken grave and then
Leave behind.