[CTPWC] My Final Demon, page 1

This is a love poem about the impact of a relationship with a music industry dragon whose psychotic love finished off my music career forever. God bless her and all her beautiful madness.

My Final Demon

“Behold my beauty.
I am all you've wanted
...all you've needed.
I can give you all you've desired,
You can now be all you've longed to be”

And indeed it was beautiful, in its own twisted way.
And it could allow me
to stand next to what I’d always desired,
...to reach for what I’d always hungered...
and it showed me a promise
that none before had shown me.
I was transfixed
I was held fast to its side.

But, of course, it was a lie.

As a gorgeous serpent –
with colors I’d heard of
but had never seen with my own eyes
it was so strangely wonderful,
and so clearly deadly.
But I’d played these games before.
I’d toyed with the demons before.
I’d lived among them, enjoyed their fun,
I’d always walked out clean

But, of course, this became different.

As I picked it up,
I completely knew
that if I ever set it down,
it would kill me.

So, of course, I became its own.

I felt its weight coil against me.
I felt it press its cold flesh to mine.
I felt its very cells begin the slow and deadly work
of slipping silently within me,
blending quietly within me,
boring deeply within me,
replacing the very cells that define me
its body, to become my body,
its life, to become my life.
Its effort to possess me,
to devour me,
my own
and I could not break free

When I had finally stopped fighting,
when I had finally stopped caring,
when I had finally found my small place
within the life and world of this monster,
whenI was finally lost in comfortable agony,
my God took pity on me.
My God sent an angel to me,
...an angel to deliver me...
to give me one last chance at a life of my own.

And she told me
“You must set it down and walk away.”

“But, I am afraid and I cannot!”
I cried out
“It will bite me, it will kill me!”

Then she smiled and said,
“Yes, it will bite you
for that is what it does,
but you are stronger than you think,
and you will live.
Just set it down and walk away.”

So, I did.

The beast replied with fury.
The monster writhed with violence
The serpent struck and struck again.
Its hate was hot. It blinded me.
As it tore itself free
in twisting, spinning fits of rage,
it cursed the wounds it left behind
My body, then,
convulsed in deep open bloody rips,
in mangled shreds of gore
that hung from where
this beast had been
where it had grown, become a part of me
It shrieked with a venom
that I could never have imagined
...a poisonous tirade...
presenting me to those I loved
as a vile leper,
an object of derision and scorn,
a creature, disfigured and marked,
forever to be cast away
turned away,
shunned by those I had now grown to need.

But still my angel smiled,
as she held my shattered body.

“This was your final demon.
So, of course it was your worst.
Would you have expected any less?”

And, I tried to understand,
as I suffered this new hell,
and discovered, even then,
that I now grieved the loss of my demon
and its horrible, comfortable agony.

“I set it down and it killed me”
I cried in my angel’s arms.
“It tore me and bit me
and ripped my body with its rage,
and handed me over to my failure.
I don’t know that I’ll survive,
as the pain grows stronger by the second.”

Still, my angel, she smiled.

“This was your final demon.
So, of course it was your worst.
Would you have expected any less?”

I devoted myself to understand.

The months dragged on
as the pain grew and waned.
Like the tides, it ebbed and flowed,
with no end in sight,
And still she smiled.

“I’m here for your relief
but I cannot take on your pain.
I am here to love you,
to comfort you,
to help you see the truth,
but your pain is yours alone.
Yours to feel alone.”

So, I fought to understand.

But then the pain began to change.
It was darker, more horrific.
I could feel the rage.
I could feel the violence.
I could feel the hatred of the monster that had savaged me.
I felt its loathing.
I felt its confusion.
I felt its own pain and felt its torture.
I felt its hatred of itself
and I sought to destroy it.

And my angel didn't smile.

“This was your final demon.
So, of course it is your worst.
Did you expect it’d be over so soon?”

I failed to understand.

“It ripped me to shreds.
It stole my life.
It stole my love.
It stole the respect and stature I’d worked so hard to win.
It gave and then it ripped away.
It attacked and it left me to die!
I am free to hate it!
I am free to seek its destruction!
I am free to bring violence and retribution!”

And now my angel wept.

“It only took back what it had given you.
It can only take what is its own.
It offered you what it had in exchange for your life
....in exchange for your soul.
This was your final demon
So, of course it was to be your worst.”

And I was furious.

“Its life became my life!
Its world became my world!
Its very cells became my...!!!”

And I began to understand.

“This was your final demon,” she whispered.
“Of course, it would be your worst.
In that it is not yet over, there should be no surprise.
Now come your true test.
Now comes the final trial
that makes this your toughest quest of all.
Can you forgive the demon?
Can you love the demon for this test it’s blessed you with
and walk away?”

Her gentleness settled like warmth
draped lovingly over my rigid angry frame
as I fought to accept her wisdom.
And still I struggle today.

Can I ever become as the angels?
Can I ever forgive the beast
for giving me all I ever wanted
with a malignant twist
that made it impossible for me to accept?
The monster has torn from me all that it had given me,
all that I had felt had become my life and myself.
Can I ever forgive this?
Will I pass this most terrible of tests?

My angel, she smiles
“This was your final demon.
So, of course it was your worst.
Would you have expected any less?”

So, I wait
and I struggle to craft my own deliverance,
to learn of the power and glory
and agony
of God’s only truth of love,
as my angel smiles
....and waits,
and patiently watches me grow.