The Kingdom

The Birds are circling overhead, and I am close enough to hear the Rattlesnakes, their tails chattering and screaming. How do they know that within me, there is a prey in need of catching? Hold fast, hold strong. I won’t let them into this room, this chest with buckles too ornate for what is housed inside — a wilting houseplant, a weak old creature in need of light. They scratch and strike at the door, the lid, the sounds bite into my skin and look me in the eyes, paralyzing me, transfixing me, so I can do nothing but hold fast, hold strong. Never yielding.

Yet I know what peace looks like. A boy (or something of the sort), brown eyes, brown hair, bare, open, sleeping. Snakes coil around his limbs, Birds nest at his feet. Above — the Sun, the Heavens, a Question, a Cure.

It felt exactly as it should — the corpse, reanimated, steps into his older, wiser skin. Rinse, dry, repeat.