Consumption

Unhinge your jaw, snake, what’s a little more? You’re eating worlds faster than they make them And nothing fills you better than a tale of love and war. You’re ravenous, really, making feasts out of beasts. You’re every monster’s monster and your hunger never dies As your shadow stretches over bones you’ve bleached. Jormungand’s ribs poke like toothpicks in your teeth, Tying twine ‘round your molars ‘til gaps and the string Melt to baleen and bone, fangs unused and unseen. You sift through the dead and your previous meals Searching for something to take off the edge Of the wound in your skull that never quite heals. Come on, snake, devour, it’s all you can do— You cannibalize the length of your life When you’ve run out of ways to avoid the truth. You see thousands of times but won’t open your eyes ‘Cause real life constricts but in mirrors you’re free, And your hunger hurts no one when you’re eating lies. Third-person you swallow your tail without help. The snake, ouroboros, that endless decay; You’ve consumed every lie and are left with yourself And you realize too late you ate your whole life away.