I stand in the wasteland
of a once-mighty city,
burned to cinders
by the memory
of a devil's birth.
I stand beneath a scorched sky
hearing the whispers
of the lost,
those who died in pain
calling to me
to remember them.
But they don't remember me.
I was here with them,
all those years ago,
at the heart of the blaze.
Shadows stand in
silent ceremony
around a memory
bent by perception
and perspective.
A child, wreathed in shadows,
smoke and flame,
eyes ablaze as it screams
so loud it shatters the city
and burns the sky,
A child, devil-crowned
chosen by fate
to end our world.
With that scream,
its flesh blackens and burns
and cracks,
spewing lava and smoke,
scarring its newborn body,
even as it bloats into immensity.
Its eyes are fire now
as it towers above us
beneath an amber sky.
Its screams become the inferno
that sets
the world ablaze.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
A halo of jagged obsidian
spins around its head as
it looms over us all,
arms spread wide
as the flames leap ever higher,
consuming everything.
First came the light.
Then, the shadow.
I am not what I was before.
I am a pillar of ash,
a memory of a man
lost in fire and time,
like all these other ghosts.
Footsteps echo around me,
But when I look back,
I see nothing
but another echo of myself,
smiling, laughing,
trapped in that moment
when the agony burned
so intense it became euphoric,
when the heat drove us mad
before it killed us.
Behind him is a woman,
who drapes her arms about his shoulders.
They stare at me
with black pits
where the eyes should be,
weeping ashes
as they remember what I remember,
grief cutting through the madness
I stare up at the sky,
at the distant pale light
of dreams blazing
in the endless darkness.
Ashes on my chest
are remnants of where
my heart once burned
with hope
Only silence remains,
regret and grief,
gathering,
then moldering
into quiet apathy.
But in the emptiness,
before I crumble away,
I dreamed of a time
when we were at peace
beneath the silent regard
of distant stars.
One day,
they will find us:
another people
in another time.
They will sift their fingers
through us
and wonder what became of us,
the people
of the city of ash.