deer-blood
you were just too weak; don't forgive me.
February 3rd, 2026.
Today, Betelgeuse, Antares, and Eta Carinae are all undergoing the final stages of Stellar Evolution - cores collapsing in on themselves [innards being scraped out of a mother’s womb] - Great Dimmings left to stumble across the dark.
Somewhere on Earth, a vase shatters against freezing marble tile.
“I aim to make amends by praying for your soul so that it may never be met with such viciousness again.”
The message blares on the screen amidst the shards.
Too late, too late, too late.
-
I have come to believe a deer is a facile sort of animal, you see. Fawn-Eyed and Bone-Cold at the first catch of yellowed headlights. However, no one expects the imprint from its last stare, and absolutely no one could fathom its impact upon collision.
Poor Little Lonely Star couldn’t believe the dent I’d left behind- found the fissure in his feigned indifference and pried him open. He’d speak of our wedding on the Amalfi Coast (or in Cambodia?) with the same blasé manner one might discuss the weather - niceties for the sake of niceties. Now I stood there elated for another at the altar, while simultaneously averting my gaze past bridal shops - fabric white upon glaring white - reminded that even the most pristine foundations would come to be overrun with ivy; such is the cruel rhythm of nature:
Fire ants skitter over skin, chase me around the clock face, gnaw through marrow to burrow themselves into my heart.
Sorry, father. Sorry, father. You’ll never walk me down the aisle - the timer’s ticking on you!
Better the fire ants.
Better the reddened cuticles and scabrous heart than to be the mother birthing her son devoid of innards.
-
God shatters the glass sky from above and the debris rains on my Beloved.
Lonely Stars pray ‘til the skin’s flayed off their knees, failing to realise they’re bowing to a False Saint - Forgiveness rendered Null. The Brass Angel wars with the Callous Snake in the grass who’s chameleonised herself on every soil. Let me bear the weight of both.
I tell A—— that Beauty was the Abstract Composition that never served me well - Fruit Flies Fled to Carcass; mind splintered - I turned Driver, Deer, Dent.
So it goes: every Sharp-Tongued Adult was a Fawn-Eyed Child at some point.
-
Ad astra per aspera, he sings! Such Cadence! Such Brilliance!
I hold their Dull Dreams in a vice-like grip. There’s Deer-Blood before me, Deer-Blood after me; remove the Coward’s knife plunged half-way in now, and I’ll be left Bloodless.
May all witness this Stunning Immolation of the Self.
Ad astra per aspera, you wail, but the distance from your hardship to my star is just too far.
substack feels right again when ru is posting. (this is breathtaking)
it's so over for substack nation now that you're back.