rosary — sacred and stained | narrative poem
the woods swallowed the moon,
and the night spilled over, thick and black,
coating the earth like wet tar.
the trees stretched their spines
towards the heavens, crooked and hollow,
their branches clawing at the darkness
as if they, too, mourned you.
i found you there —
crumpled like a shrivelled painting,
your blood pooling in the dirt
like spilled wine at some forsaken altar.
it glistened under the sickle of the moon,
a sacrifice to a god neither of us prayed to,
a god we defied with every breath.
the rosary hung slack around
your neck, its beads stained red,
glinting like your tears.
i fell to my knees, hands trembling,
slick with the gore of you, torn between
the gnawing hunger in my chest and
the horror clawing at my throat.
your breath rattled like an organ played
by dying hands and i could hear it —
the low hymn of the forest, its shadows
stretching the aisle of a forgotten cathedral.
you shivered beneath my touch,
your body soft, like wet wax melting
beneath a flame.
“don’t." i begged as you tried
to itch closer.
but your hand found my hair,
tangled and tender, the way it always did
when you asked me to take too much.
there was a time i only took what
you offered.
nights soaked in the amber glow
of the streetlamp, its light bleeding
through the blinds, casting your body
in gold and shadows.
you extended your wrist, pale
and waiting, ‘just a little,’ you said.
the bandages barely had time to yellow
before my teeth found your skin again.
i never asked why you liked the way
i craved you. why your smile curved
like a knife as you watched me sucked
at the warmth of your flesh, my breath
hot against the fragile rhythm of your pulse.
but it was always more for you, wasn’t it?
the power of being the flame to my moth,
the keeper taming my unholy hunger.
you cradled my head to your chest,
laughing when my teeth grazed
too close to the edge.
‘careful,’ you said, ‘you don’t want
to ruin me, do you?’
you didn’t know.
you never knew.
that i needed to.
now, here you are.
ruined and broken,
your chest a wreckage of crimson
and breath, your father’s wrath carved
into you like scripture into stone.
i wanted to hold you. i wanted to scream,
to drag you from the grave you were
digging for us both.
but it was you that pulled me closer,
your touch gentle, like a lover, like a priest,
like you have already forgiven me
for what you were about to make me do.
“go ahead. eat," you said,
“take what you need.”
and in that moment, i hated you.
i hated you for your mercy,
for your surrender, for making me
the monster i fought so
desperately to ease.
your hand guided my head down,
pressing me into the fevered heat
of your body. i hesitated, my tears
spilling like rain into the open wound.
you said, "don’t stop this time,"
even as your breath stuttered
and caught in your chest.
your ribs opened beneath my hands,
blooming like the petals of a blackened flower,
wet with blood and clinging sinew.
beneath them, the labyrinth
of your body unveiled itself —
arteries like rivers, bone glinting like
alabaster in the dark, and the pale coils
of your intestines shifting under my touch.
i dug my fingers deeper,
into the pulsing heart of you,
pulling apart flesh that clung
to my hands like ripe fruit splitting open.
the scent of blood and decay
tainted the air, heavy as iron chains,
folding around me like funeral linens.
i pressed my lips to the wound,
to the temple of you, and devoured.
i remembered the first time i saw you —
asleep in the back pew of an empty church,
the evening sun making a halo of your hair.
the rosary you wore then, was unbroken.
unstained. its clean beads resting on your chest
as if guarding your breath. your pulse flickered
in your throat, fluttering like a bird against a cage,
a rhythm i wanted to match with my teeth.
even then, i thought about sinking them
into you,
just once, just to see what you tasted
like —
i thought i’d never get the chance.
you arched beneath me,
a grotesque dance of agony and surrender,
and your voice broke into wet, guttural sounds
as i tore you open, piece by trembling piece.
the taste of you — salt and copper,
sin and salvation —
spread across my tongue like a sacrament,
each mouthful a hymn sung in the dark.
i wanted to stop. i wanted to stop.
but i couldn’t.
you wouldn’t let me go.
"it has to be like this,"
your hands tightened in my hair,
with the strength and desperation of someone
clinging to life and offering it all at once.
"it was always going to be like this."
the first time i kissed you,
your blood was still warm on my tongue.
you guided me then, too, your hands steady,
tilting my chin like an artist
shaping delicate porcelain.
you tasted like pomegranate seeds —
sweet and bitter, laced with something forbidden.
you pressed me closer, your lips bruising
against mine, and soon
our bodies met like dark water,
merging, sinking, drowning.
your breath shuddered in my ear,
your fingers tracing prayers into my skin—
not to god, but to me.
you whispered my name like it was
deliverance, even as i knew
you were my ruin.
i thought maybe this was love —
to devour, to be devoured,
to feel the ache of devotion
carved into my ribs like a sacred
artifact,
etched so deep
it became part of me.
you never stopped me.
you never asked me to.
“don’t cry,” you coughed, your chest heaving,
“look at the sky.” blood stained your lips,
but still, your hand weakly caressed my hair,
as if the pain of me crying was heavier than
my nails ripping you apart.
i looked up, the stars blurred through
the tears in my eyes, cold and merciless,
watching me take what little was left of you.
you once told me the sky
was where your mother lived,
how you’d find her in the constellations
on the nights you couldn’t sleep.
you asked me, ‘do you think
i’ll go there too?’,
i couldn’t answer you then.
but now, as your trembling hand
pushed against my head,
as though urging me to finish what
we both knew had to be done,
the answer burned clear in my chest.
i understood what you meant.
you wanted me to take you there.
when i looked back down,
your hand had slipped from my hair,
falling lifeless to your side.
your chest lay still, silent,
the rise and fall of breath forever stolen.
your glassy eyes stared upward,
fixed on something far beyond
my reach — a heaven i couldn’t follow.
a place that would never open for me.
and your lips, parted and bloodied,
held the ghosts of words you would
never speak.
i sat there, shaking, watching
the life drain from your face,
but you were still warm
in my veins, still burning inside me.
your life now mine.
you were mine now —
not in the way i had dreamed,
not in the way i had prayed.
but you would live in me forever,
and i would carry you,
a reliquary forged from your
shattered pieces,
your blood a baptism i could never wash clean.
a stain as sacred as it was damning.
even as i stumbled to my feet,
your blood still clinging to my lips,
i knew i could never escape you.
you were gone, but you were
everywhere.
in the hollow sky,
in the jagged branches,
in the marrow of my bones.
i devoured you, but it was you
who consumed me whole.