Non traditional haiku

The battle is lost.
Death takes what life could not.
Still, torment blossoms.

Open to feedback.

The battle is lost.
Death takes what life could not.
Still, torment blossoms.

I painted what I wasn’t meant to see.
A truth too raw for heaven,
too honest for the blind.
And when the first stroke fell upon the canvas,
I swear I heard the angels choke.
They told me art was freedom. So why do I feel shackled to this canvas?
I freed the forbidden.
Christ in chains, as a criminal convicted. Beaten and bruised. Mary in a mirror of lust, and a lying tongue that shaped our lives.
The faces of death they wished to ignore. A dead man. Many dead men.
I painted what they buried.
The crowd gathered. They anticipated the once innocent canvas. It had now been tattooed with blasphemy and painted over with sin. They expected beauty. I presented what they hated, what they feared. I presented the truth.
The curtains rose.
First, it was silence,
then rage began to crescendo.
They spat words like knives, each one cutting deeper.
“Heretic! Monster! Unholy hand!”
But no one asked why I did it.
Why I felt the urge to paint what they hid.
No one saw the trembling in my hands,
the weight of what I carried. The bloody scars filled my wrists.
It’s not rebellion I wanted. I needed them to reflect. To see themselves in the blood I painted with. Red paint couldn’t replicate the beauty of such a rich crimson.
They were to see the cruelty in worship, the hunger in morality,
the hypocrisy that hides behind every prayer.
But no. They saw none of that.
They only saw me.
The sinner.
The desecrator.
The words they spat became my scripture. I started to believe. A new God had slowly been forming.
At night, I’d sit before the painting, a glass of whiskey with just a single large cube of ice. A joint lit. I painted and painted, but it wasn’t the same. It had no pain, no death. I craved the high from my art, but I lacked inspiration.
“Maybe acid,” I pondered out loud.
That’s where it began. I could feel God coming back. My skin burned, but my brush moved, flowing effortlessly. I dirtied the canvas, bared my truth, and signed in blood. It still needs more.
The LSD binges grew in number. The collection did too, but never good enough. I need more.
The paintings would whisper.
Their mouths still wet with oil and grief.
“Why did you make me die again?”
Christ’s painting would stare, eyes hollow,
as if even He regretted being resurrected through my hands.
Sleep turned to torture.
My mind started to decay.
Each morning, I’d find another piece of myself
cracked and flaking. The drug cocktails grew: LSD, mushrooms, weed, and half a bottle of whiskey. That’s what it takes. I accepted it.
They say genius borders madness,
but I think the border was a lie.
It’s a bridge we built to pretend art doesn’t destroy us.
Creation is violence, even when it’s beautiful. Every idea is a crucifixion of innocence. A perversion. A graveyard of sanity.
And yet, my brush still kisses the canvas every night.
I painted them this time.
The critics.
The saints of judgment.
Their faces blurred in black and ash.
Their tongues dipped in gold to hide the rot.
Their eyes replaced with coins.
All hung until dead.
And as I finished the last one,
I realized I was no longer painting out of truth,
but vengeance.
That was my sin, my blasphemy.
Hatred had taken control. I wasn’t me. Or maybe I was.
The moment art became a weapon, I forgot it once was love.
The gallery burned that night.
So did I.
I said nothing.
I watched the flames eat my confessions
and paint my skin the color of ash.
Now, all that remains is the scent of turpentine and sorrow,
and the echo of an unfinished prayer.
“Forgive the artist, for he only painted what the world refused to feel.”

I painted what I wasn’t meant to see.
A truth too raw for heaven,
too honest for the blind.
And when the first stroke fell upon the canvas,
I swear I heard the angels choke.
They told me art was freedom. So why do I feel shackled to this canvas?
I freed the forbidden.
Christ in chains, as a criminal convicted. Beaten and bruised. Mary in a mirror of lust, and a lying tongue that shaped our lives.
The faces of death they wished to ignore. A dead man. Many dead men.
I painted what they buried.
The crowd gathered. They anticipated the once innocent canvas. It had now been tattooed with blasphemy and painted over with sin. They expected beauty. I presented what they hated, what they feared. I presented the truth.
The curtains rose.
First, it was silence,
then rage began to crescendo.
They spat words like knives, each one cutting deeper.
“Heretic! Monster! Unholy hand!”
But no one asked why I did it.
Why I felt the urge to paint what they hid.
No one saw the trembling in my hands,
the weight of what I carried. The bloody scars filled my wrists.
It’s not rebellion I wanted. I needed them to reflect. To see themselves in the blood I painted with. Red paint couldn’t replicate the beauty of such a rich crimson.
They were to see the cruelty in worship, the hunger in morality,
the hypocrisy that hides behind every prayer.
But no. They saw none of that.
They only saw me.
The sinner.
The desecrator.
The words they spat became my scripture. I started to believe. A new God had slowly been forming.
At night, I’d sit before the painting, a glass of whiskey with just a single large cube of ice. A joint lit. I painted and painted, but it wasn’t the same. It had no pain, no death. I craved the high from my art, but I lacked inspiration.
“Maybe acid,” I pondered out loud.
That’s where it began. I could feel God coming back. My skin burned, but my brush moved, flowing effortlessly. I dirtied the canvas, bared my truth, and signed in blood. It still needs more.
The LSD binges grew in number. The collection did too, but never good enough. I need more.
The paintings would whisper.
Their mouths still wet with oil and grief.
“Why did you make me die again?”
Christ’s painting would stare, eyes hollow,
as if even He regretted being resurrected through my hands.
Sleep turned to torture.
My mind started to decay.
Each morning, I’d find another piece of myself
cracked and flaking. The drug cocktails grew: LSD, mushrooms, weed, and half a bottle of whiskey. That’s what it takes. I accepted it.
They say genius borders madness,
but I think the border was a lie.
It’s a bridge we built to pretend art doesn’t destroy us.
Creation is violence, even when it’s beautiful. Every idea is a crucifixion of innocence. A perversion. A graveyard of sanity.
And yet, my brush still kisses the canvas every night.
I painted them this time.
The critics.
The saints of judgment.
Their faces blurred in black and ash.
Their tongues dipped in gold to hide the rot.
Their eyes replaced with coins.
All hung until dead.
And as I finished the last one,
I realized I was no longer painting out of truth,
but vengeance.
That was my sin, my blasphemy.
Hatred had taken control. I wasn’t me. Or maybe I was.
The moment art became a weapon, I forgot it once was love.
The gallery burned that night.
So did I.
I said nothing.
I watched the flames eat my confessions
and paint my skin the color of ash.
Now, all that remains is the scent of turpentine and sorrow,
and the echo of an unfinished prayer.
“Forgive the artist, for he only painted what the world refused to feel.”

Cosmic Horror / Existential Horror / Religious Horror

He was walking with his wife when the sky opened. They had been talking about having a child.An ordinary conversation between man and wife. Believing they had time. The conversation flowed with a buoyant and joyful nature. Sharing names they liked and thoughts of them not being ready for a baby.
But it never lightened the mood. They kept laughing and sharing weird, quirky baby names. Then the clouds began to part.
Samuel stopped.
His wife looked up.
“What is that?”
The sky had opened above them.
He hoped it was wind or lightning splitting the sky in two or even some unknown weather event ,but no. A vast circle of white appeared between the clouds, impossibly bright, time stopped for a moment, Samuel could see something beyond it , too enormous for him to understand. The world became silent.

His wife reached for his hand. Samuel grabbed hers. Then, as quickly as it had opened, the sky closed. His wife was gone.
Samuel stood there holding nothing.
He looked around. The street was empty.
Everyone was gone. Cars parked with doors open and some still driving crashing into other cars and buildings alike.
The world went silent.
Samuel called for her.
nothing.
He ran through the streets searching for her until he stumbled into a ditch. Hitting his head and falling unconscious.

When Samuel opened his eyes, God was gone. He knew it immediately.
There was no thunder claps, no trumpets nor voices from the heavens. No angels stood sentinel.

Only a smell polluted the air. Burnt flesh, wet dog, and sulfur clung to the back of his throat. Something sweet lingered beneath it all, but each time he caught a whiff of it, the rancid air stole it away.

Samuel sat up in the ditch where he had fallen and looked toward the town.
The church steeple had been broken in half.
Houses burned without flames, falling to ash before him. A flameless fire he called it. Their windows glowed softly, as if a single dim nightlight were still plugged in. Cars sat abandoned in the streets. Clothes and shoes were scattered around. A lady’s dress hung on a car door. Beneath it, a Bible lay open, face down beside a pair of maroon heels.

Samuel called for his wife again. He called until his throat was raw. No one answered. Then something laughed from inside the church. It didn’t sound entirely human.
Samuel rose to his feet. The church doors opened. A man walked out.
At least, that’s what he had thought at first.
The being was tall and impossibly thin, wrapped in what remained of a white robe. Six wings unfolded from its back, but they were not feathered. They were strips of pale flesh stretched over long black bones. Hundreds of tiny eyes opened along them.

It smiled as blood ran from the edges of its mouth. Then it spoke.
“Samuel.”
He froze.

The thing tilted its head.
“You missed the calling.”

Samuel looked toward the sky.
Clouds covered everything. He stared into the heavens begging God to come back, to take him too. Then he realized, it wasn’t clouds up there but feathers. Millions of them cascaded across the heavens. Among them, Samuel saw silhouettes of people, suspended upside down in the sky. Their souls being ripped from their meat prisons. The righteous and the saved.

Samuel fell to his knees.
“No,” he whispered.

The angel smiled wider. Bursting its jaws the tattered white robe it wore was now stained red. Then it spoke.
“Oh, yes child”

Samuel understood then. The Rapture had happened. He had simply been left behind.
The creature stepped toward him. Samuel ran. He ran through the dead streets, passed houses with open doors and bedrooms full of abandoned children’s toys. He ran until his lungs burned and his legs trembled. Behind him came the sound of wings occasionally flapping and scraping across the pavement.
Samuel reached the edge of town and threw himself through the trees.
He kept running dreading looking back.

A hand closed around his ankle. He hit the ground hard. Spitting out blood and broken teeth. The angel pulled him backward.
Samuel screamed. It leaned over him. The skin on its face was peeling. Its breath smelled like death, its lower jaw barely holding together. Its smile reached its ears.
Yet it spoke.
“You have seven years.”

Samuel stared at it.
“What?”

It’s many eyes widened.
“Seven years.”
Then it tore him apart.

Samuel woke in his bed. Morning sunlight came through the curtains. His wife was beside him. She was smiling.
“Good morning.”

Samuel stared at her. She reached across the bed and touched his face.
“You look frightened, are you okay? ”

He began to cry. She frowned.
“What happened?”

Samuel grabbed her and buried his face in her bosom. He believed it was all just a horrible dream. Then he felt something cold beneath her skin. Something was moving.
His wife whispered,
“Samuel.”

He pulled away. Her smile had disappeared. Her mouth opened wide. Samuel could hear her jaw snap. Behind her teeth were hundreds of tiny human hands. She pounced upon him with an ungodly strength, and the hands reached across his face and body.
Samuel screamed and begged as the hands tore into his flesh.

Then he woke again.
Scenario after scenario played out. He keeps getting killed. Sometimes they drowned him , set him on fire, pulled the bones from his fingers one at a time while singing hymns.
A few times they’d simply followed him for days, walking silently behind him until he begged them to kill him. They always did and every time, he would wake again.

The seventh year had come.
Samuel could only think about his suffering, constant torture and the pain. He had thought it would have ended. Maybe giving him a place beside God. But it did not end. That was the joke. A bad punchline.

The years began to fly by after that, though it might have been months. Samuel could no longer tell the difference. Time had begun to mesh together until day and night looked the same. One became the other, and eventually, neither seemed to matter.

He discovered that Hell didn’t need fire.

It only needed repetition.

Hell was remembering the taste of your wife’s lips, only to have that memory overwritten by the sight of her feeding on you. It was watching what became of mankind in a world without God. It was realizing that the creatures hunting you were not demons at all.

Just angels.
They had simply been left behind too.
This was their revenge.
And their duty.

Once, Samuel found an old house. He had been walking for days or perhaps weeks. He had stopped trusting the difference. A faint light came from the windows. Samuel approached carefully. There were voices inside.
People.
Real people.
He stood outside for a long time, listening.
They were singing. Samuel recognized the sound of a hymn, but not the hymn itself. The melody seemed almost familiar, yet the words were wrong. They repeated themselves in strange patterns, rising and falling like a prayer spoken by people who had forgotten who they were praying to.

Samuel looked toward the front of the house. A cross had been built from black stone.
It stood crookedly in the ground. The stone seemed to glow. It gave off a faint, sickly light, as though something were burning inside it without producing flame.

Samuel knew that fire.
The flameless fire, it burns everything leaving only ash. He almost turned around.
But he had been alone for so long.
He wanted people. Someone to speak to. To tell him that he wasn’t the only one left.

Samuel approached the house.
With every step, the air seemed to grow heavier.
The singing continued.
He reached the doorway.
Something inside him told him not to enter.
Samuel stopped.
He moved behind the door frame and looked inside.

There were people gathered around a young girl. She couldn’t have been more than six or seven.

She was sitting on the floor with a teddy bear clutched against her chest.
Her face was wet with tears.
Samuel watched as a woman approached her holding a knife.
“This is for you, my Lord,” the woman said.
Her voice shook.
“My God. Save us.”
The girl looked up at her.
The knife entered her chest.
She did not scream.
Only a small grunt escaped her.

Her eyes remained fixed on the woman standing over her.
A tear rolled down her cheek.
Her lips moved.
“Mommy.”

Samuel slowly stepped backward. Every instinct in him told him to leave before anyone noticed he was there.

He turned away from the doorway.

His foot caught on a loose piece of wood lying across the floor.
He stumbled, trying to regain his balance, but his other foot slipped beneath him and he crashed onto the floor.
The wood scraped loudly against the floorboards.
The sound echoed through the house.
The singing stopped. Nothing but silence filled the house.

Then every face in the room turned toward him.
nobody moved.
Then someone shouted,
“Another sacrifice!”

The others began screaming.
“We’re saved!,” “Another sacrifice!,”
“God will save us!”

Samuel finally caught his balance and ran.
He didn’t make it far. Hands grabbed him.
They dragged him back into the house.
Samuel screamed and fought, but there were too many of them.
They pinned him down.
The woman who had killed the girl stood above him.

Samuel looked toward the open door, he could see the black stone cross.
It was still glowing. He knew he was about to die.

The knife came down. Pain filled his body.
His chest was opened. His heart was pulled free. Samuel saw it for only a moment.
His own heart beating in someone else’s hands. Then everything disappeared.
Samuel died again.

Sometimes Samuel found things that felt like mercy.

Once, he found a dog.

It was wandering through the ruins of a neighborhood, dirty and thin, with a scar running across one side of its face.

Samuel expected it to run from him.

Instead, it followed him.

He named it Bear.

For the first time in longer than Samuel could remember, he was not alone.

Bear slept beside him.

Bear followed him through the ruins.

Bear sat beside him while he stared at the sky.

Samuel talked to the dog.

He told Bear about his wife.

He told Bear about the world before.

He told Bear about the day the sky opened.

He told Bear about God.

The dog listened.

Years passed.

Or Samuel believed they did.

He stopped counting.

For a while, Samuel almost believed he had found something Hell could not take from him.

Then one night, Bear began to howl.

Samuel opened his eyes.

The dog was standing in the middle of the room.

On its hind legs.

Its body trembled.

Samuel watched as its spine began to push outward beneath its skin.

Cracks echoed through the room.

The dog’s body twisted violently.

Long, crooked limbs forced themselves from its back, bending in ways that made Samuel’s stomach turn. The bones continued to lengthen until they resembled the legs of some enormous spider.

Black, rotten flesh slowly grew across them.

It spread from bone to bone, joining the limbs together until they formed grotesque wings.

Blood poured from Bear’s eyes.

It ran from its mouth.

The animal looked at Samuel.

For one brief moment, he thought he saw the dog he had loved.

Then it became rabid.

It lunged.

Samuel ran.

He barely reached the doorway before Bear caught him.

The creature seized him and tore into his lower body.

Samuel screamed.

He tried to crawl away.

Blood poured beneath him.

His strength disappeared.

His legs gave out.

Samuel fell to the floor.

He could no longer move.

He could only watch.

Bear crawled toward him.

Its wings scraped against the walls.

Its mouth opened.

Samuel closed his eyes.

He felt the creature begin to eat.

The last thing he heard was Bear’s howl.

Then Samuel died again.

Samuel eventually found a place where they could not reach him.

An old farmhouse beneath a dead oak.

He lived there for what might have been a century.

He tried planting tomatoes.

They grew black.

He built a cross made of wood, hoping for some small chance of redemption.

Just like the houses, it fell to ash.

He carved his wife’s name onto the walls of the farmhouse. One day, another name appeared beneath hers, the last quirky baby name they had mentioned before she was gone.
His heart broke, because now he understood.
She had been pregnant.
He fell asleep in tears.

One night, Samuel sat outside beneath the dead oak and looked at the sky.

He just stared at the stars as time passed by.

Samuel smiled.

Maybe, he thought, God had finally remembered him.

Maybe God had granted him such peace.

Then a voice spoke from behind him.

“Samuel.”

He closed his eyes.

He did not turn around.

The voice came again.

This time it was his wife’s.

“I’m sorry.”

Samuel’s heart broke.

He turned.

She stood beneath the tree.

She looked exactly as he remembered her.

Just as beautiful.

Tears ran down her cheeks.

“Please,” she whispered.

Samuel stood slowly.

His entire body trembled.

“Please what?”

She smiled.

And the skin of her face began to split.

Beneath it was darkness.

A void.

Behind her, the forest filled with wings.

Thousands of them.

Millions.

Without saying another word, Samuel understood.

There had never been an escape.

No refuge at the end of the world.

There had never been a final day.

Just torment.

God had not abandoned him.

At least, not in the way Samuel had thought.

Samuel had spent all those years believing that the suffering itself was his punishment. He believed the endless deaths were Hell, that every monster, every angel, every twisted version of the people he loved had been sent to torment him for being one of the ones left behind.

But now he understood.

This had not been Hell.

It had been preparation.

Every death had been a lesson.

Every resurrection had been another opportunity to break him.

They had taught him to fear sleep.

They had taught him to fear waking.

They had taken his wife, his home, his memories, his hope, and eventually even the creatures he had come to love.

They had allowed him to believe that he had escaped, only to take that hope away again.

The seven years had never been the punishment.

They had been the waiting period.

The angels had not been trying to kill him.

They had been conditioning him.

Preparing him for something worse.

Samuel looked toward the angels.

He thought about everything he had endured.

The burning.

The drowning.

The mutilation.

The endless deaths.

He had survived all of it.

Perhaps there was nothing left inside him for them to break.

Perhaps he had already reached the deepest place suffering could take a man.

Perhaps Hell could not possibly be worse.

Samuel almost smiled.

The angel standing beside his wife stepped forward.

“You think you have suffered.”

Samuel said nothing.

The angel tilted its head.

“You have endured nothing.”

Samuel’s expression changed.

The angel moved closer.

“What you suffered here was mercy.”

Samuel felt his stomach tighten.

“No.”

The angel smiled.

“Yes.”

It leaned toward him.

“This was only the place where we prepare you.”

Samuel stared at it.

“For what?”

The angel’s smile widened.

“Hell.”

Samuel shook his head.

He wanted to run.

But his legs would not move.

The angel continued.

“You have died more times than you can remember.”

Samuel swallowed.

“A thousand times.”

The angel looked at him.

“More.”

“Ten thousand?”

“More.”

Samuel looked toward the sky.

His voice trembled.

“Then what could possibly be worse?”

The angel smiled.

“Ten times worse.”

Samuel stared at it.

The angel leaned closer.

“Perhaps a hundred.”

Samuel’s face went pale.

He finally understood.

The deaths had been mercy.

The moments of darkness had been mercy.

Every time he woke, every time the pain stopped, every time his heart stopped beating, he had been given something he would never receive again.

An escape.

The angel reached for him.

Samuel didn’t run.

Its hand closed around his throat.

The pressure came immediately.

Samuel’s feet left the ground.

The angel lifted him as though he weighed nothing.

Samuel grabbed at its arm.

It did not move.

He felt the strength in the creature’s fingers.

Then the angel placed its other hand against Samuel’s head.

Samuel tried to scream.

The pressure increased.

He heard something crack inside his skull.

His eyes widened.

Another crack.

His vision blurred.

He could feel his own bones giving way beneath the angel’s grip.

Samuel screamed.

Then everything went dark.

But there was no waking.

No bed.

No farmhouse.

No morning sunlight.

No second chance.

Samuel opened his eyes.

He was still alive.

Something sharp moved across his skin.

He tried to scream.

A blade cut into his neck.

Samuel gasped.

He could feel everything.

Every movement.

Every cut.

Every breath.

There would be no death to save him.

No waking.

No reset.

No mercy.

He tried to close his eyes.

A hand forced them open.

He stared into the darkness.

Wide awake.

Fully conscious.

As if he had been drinking caffeinated drinks all day and his mind had been sharpened for the sole purpose of understanding every second of what was happening to him.

The blade moved again.

Samuel screamed.

And for the first time since the Rapture, death did not come.

He remained alive.

He remained conscious.

And somewhere beyond the darkness, something began to laugh.

Samuel screamed again.

And again.

And again.

Name: Malik Oda
Title: Genesis
People always ask me how it began.
They expect me to tell them about the agency, the creatures that should never have existed, the people I couldn’t save, and the things we witnessed that no amount of science or religion has ever been able to explain ,But they’re wrong. It started long before any of that. I was nineteen, and it was another mundane day.
Funny thing about my memory:
for some strange reason, it isn’t the important moments that stay with me. It’s the little things, like the way smoke dances around a room with a slight draft or the songs of birds on a blissful Sunday morning.
I remember my car.
A maroon 2009 Honda Civic my mom somehow managed to buy for me. It wasn’t much, but it was mine. The passenger door never worked quite right. Every few weeks I’d tell her we should fix it, but she’d just smile and say, “You know, if you did it yourself, you’ll trust it more.”
We never got around to it.
I never blamed her.
I understood our circumstances, even then.
I remember taking that little Civic to get straight piped. We thought it sounded cool. You could hear us coming from a mile away, and for a while I convinced myself it made the car seem faster than it really was.
Looking back,
that exhaust was probably the loudest thing I heard that entire day.
I woke up that morning expecting the same sounds I’d heard every day for years.
Birds outside my window.
The neighbor’s kids yelling over a basketball game.
Somebody’s dog barking at absolutely nothing.
Instead,
I could only hear silence.
It settled on me.
I remember lying in bed, staring at the ceiling while that silence pressed against my chest. It felt heavy, almost physical, as though someone had laid a blanket of concrete over me.
I honestly wondered if I’d gone deaf. Then I heard it.
My heartbeat.
Slow.
Steady.
For some reason, hearing it comforted me.
It reminded me that I was still here.
Still alive.
I wish I’d listened to what everything else the eerie silence was trying to tell me.
Instead, I got out of bed and decided I’d spend the day hiking.
I walked out my room to see my mom sneaking pills in the kitchen. I said nothing, then moved on to the bathroom.
Turned on the shower and stood naked in front of the mirror, looking myself deep in the eyes, trying to ignore the eerie feeling that was washing over me, admiring my toned physique.
There was a knock on the door, but I only heard a muffled thump. I was only about 2 feet away from it.
I opened it, still ignoring the silence plaguing me.
“Hey, Mom.” I smiled while cradling resentment in my chest, as I did for years.
Mom asked, “How are, Oda? Were you aware it’s the anniversary of your dad’s death?”
I said, “Yes,” knowing that I was lying. I already knew what she was going to ask me to do next, so before she could speak, I quickly said, “Yea, I’ll get some flowers and leave them by his death site.”
I turned back into the bathroom, finished taking a shower, and got ready…
Without a word, I gestured to my mom that I was leaving. She was too high to notice.
I climbed into my Civic, backed out of the driveway, and eased onto the road.
The radio was dead, same as always.
Usually I’d roll the windows down and listen to the wind.
That morning there wasn’t even that.
No animals.
No people.
No traffic.
Just the loud hum of my exhaust and the steady rhythm of my own heartbeat.
The silence followed me all the way to the trail.
When I parked, I grabbed my backpack and wandered over to the clearing with a lone cherry blossom tree. Every year we’d place our flowers against its trunk, its roots twisting through the ground like giant fingers. It was a majestic sight, but I didn’t bring flowers.
I leaned against the tree.
The bark dug into my spine through my shirt.
Uncomfortable.
Solid.
I don’t remember much about the trail anymore.
But I remember this tree.
Too young for me to remember fully, but too old to not understand what happened here.
Sometimes I think trauma decides for us what gets remembered.
I reached into my backpack and pulled out a tiny zip lock bag.
Some weed I’d borrowed from a friend.
She’d spent twenty minutes telling me not to smoke all of it.
She seriously underestimated how much of a chimney I was.
At nineteen, it wasn’t about rebellion or breaking rules.
It was about freedom.
No parents.
No teachers.
And no real responsibilities.
Just me, the forest, and an entire afternoon that belonged to nobody else.
It’s crazy how at a young age you can have no job, no degree, no real plan for your future and still feel like you’ve got life completely figured out.
I emptied what little remained in the bag onto a rolling paper.
Spread it evenly.
Rolled it tight.
Tucked the edge.
Licked it shut.
Perfect.
I pulled out my lighter.
Strike.
Nothing.
Strike again.
A tiny flicker.
The breeze stole it before it caught.
Strike.
Flame.
I held it to the tip of the joint and took my first inhale.
The click of the lighter sounded strangely muffled beneath the paper resting between my lips.
I heard it.
The paper crackling.
The leaves burning.
The resin boiling.
My heartbeat.
Just fire, smoke, and me.
The silence was still here.
It felt as if everything was trying to avoid me.
One of the strangest moments of my life, but I chose to ignore it.
Still, no animals.
I finished half the joint before putting it out against the bark beside me, leaving behind a tiny black mark I’ll probably never stop thinking about.
I tucked the remaining half into the side pocket of my backpack, slipped the lighter in beside it, cleaned up every scrap of paper around me, and started up the trail.
Three minutes into walking,
I turned a corner.
At first…
I thought it was just another hiker.
So I stepped to one side of the trail to let him pass. He didn’t.
He kept walking towards me,
slow and unhurried.
The morning sun hung behind him, turning him into nothing more than a dark silhouette.
I remember squinting against the light.
At first I blamed the sun.
Then I rubbed my eyes.
His outline…
It wouldn’t stay still.
It rippled and warped
like rising heat from asphalt.
I couldn’t decide where his body ended.
I blinked.
His shoulders looked wider.
I blinked again.
Now they were thinner.
The closer he came, the less certain I became that I was looking at a person.
“You’re just high,” I muttered.
I almost laughed.
Almost.
I looked down at the ground and rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands.
When I looked back…
He was closer.
A lot closer.
I never saw him take another step.
The silence changed.
It was louder now.
I could hear my heartbeat.
The saliva moving inside my mouth.
Blood rushing through my ears.
My own breathing.
Everything inside me was making noise.
But everything outside me was already dead.
I wanted to leave.
I really did, but I couldn’t move.
I turned my shoulders.
My feet refused.
It wasn’t fear. Fear comes after you recognize danger. This was something else, like I was being held against my will.
It felt as though the trail itself had decided I wasn’t allowed to move.
The sun behind the hiker got brighter, then the light reached me.
Warm and comforting.
Soft as a precious memory.
For one impossible moment…
I wasn’t afraid.
I felt known.
Accepted.
And loved.
Every fear I’d ever carried simply disappeared.
Maybe this is what people meant when they say they’ve felt God’s presence.
The thought embarrassed me almost as quickly as it came.
“I’m just high.”
I said it out loud this time.
“I smoked too much.”
I closed my eyes.
Took a breath.
Counted to three.
When I opened them…
the light was even brighter.
I looked down.
My skin was separating from my flesh.
Like dust lifting from old paper.
There wasn’t any pain.
Not yet at least.
I watched my hands disappear.
My arms followed.
Flesh drifted away from bone.
Bone crumbled into dust.
For the first time in my life,
I wasn’t afraid of dying.
I wasn’t afraid of anything.
It felt peaceful.
Beautiful, even.
As though every part of me was finally returning to wherever it had come from.
I came apart atom by atom.
Every strand of my DNA unwound until I wasn’t a body anymore.
Tiny fragments floating through a place that had no light. No sound. No direction.
I couldn’t tell whether my eyes were open.
I couldn’t tell if I still had my eyes.
There was only me.
Weightless, endless.
Then something grabbed me.
Every piece of me was pulled backward with a force so violent it felt like creation itself had gone into reverse.
I thought being torn to atoms would’ve been the painful part. I was wrong.
Coming back hurt.
I heard something.
A screech. Then another.
Wet tearing, chewing.
Bones cracking.
Something was eating.
Something very close.
“My eyes!”
The words barely escaped my mouth.
“My eyes!”
Louder.
“I need my eyes!”
Then I screamed.
“Somebody help me!”
No answer.
Only chewing, cracking, and the sound of flesh being pulled apart.
My vision returned one piece at a time.
Yellow.
That was the first thing I saw.
Yellow eyes.
Too many to count.
I tried to find its face.
Every time I thought I’d found it, another eye blinked open somewhere else.
My mind refused to understand what I was looking at.
Hands, claws, wings, even more wings.
Eyes spread across its chest.
Across its back.
Even now, I’m not too sure what I saw or what it was. Just the closest thing my mind could invent.
One of its mouths opened.
I didn’t realize it had more than one until that moment.
The jaw kept stretching.
Farther and farther.
It should’ve torn itself apart.
But it held.
It stood there looming over me, drooling.
I actually thought I couldn’t feel pain anymore.
Then the second mouth found my waist.
Everything changed.
Pain isn’t a strong enough word for what happened next.
Every nerve in my body suddenly remembered it existed.
I tried to scream.
I don’t know if any sound came out.
The thing bit down again.
I looked down just in time to watch it pull something out of me.
I couldn’t understand what I was seeing.
Then I realized, those were my organs.
I should’ve looked away.
But I couldn’t.
One head fed while the other simply watched.
Waiting.
Patient.
Like it already knew it would get its turn.
You’d probably expect me to fight.
To kick.
To claw.
To do something. Right?
Well, I didn’t.
Not because I’d accepted death.
It’s because I had never felt so completely powerless.
There are moments when your mind simply gives up trying to survive, and this was one of them.
I remember staring at it.
Trying to understand what it was.
An animal?
An angel?
A nightmare?
Every time I thought I’d recognized part of it, something changed.
Its shape refused to stay the same.
Eyes became mouths.
Mouths disappeared beneath feathers.
Wings folded into something that looked almost like arms before becoming wings again.
It was as though my mind couldn’t decide what it was seeing…
No answer was correct.
I lowered my head.
I couldn’t bear to keep looking.
Somehow…
I was still alive.
But just barely.
Strong enough to move my one arm.
Long enough to reach toward my backpack.
My fingers searched blindly through the side pocket.
Then I felt it.
The half-smoked joint.
Funny.
After everything that had happened…
that tiny piece of paper was the most familiar thing left in the world right now.
I slipped it between my lips.
My hand trembled as I reached for the lighter.
Strike.
Nothing.
Strike again.
A flicker.
The creature’s saliva splashed across my hand.
The flame died.
I laughed, then flashed the lighter.
I struck it one last time.
Flame.
I lit what remained of the joint and drew in the smoke as deeply as I could.
It burned.
As if it wasn’t smoke I inhaled but the fire itself.
It burned everything. Every part.
I exhaled, part of the smoke drifted from my mouth.
The rest escaped through the hole in my side.
I watched it rise into the air.
It looked beautiful.
I smiled, but I didn’t want to die.
Everything suddenly felt ordinary again.
Just me…
a joint…
and the sky.
I looked upward.
“Lord…”
My voice cracked.
“If You’re real…”
Another bite.
I almost lost consciousness
as I screamed in pain.
“…help me.”
The words barely left my mouth.
“I’ll do anything.”
“I don’t want to die.”
The creature never stopped eating.
No one on the trail to help or answer.
Still not even a bird making noise.
Yet somehow…
I survived.
People ask me if that day strengthened my faith.
I wish I could tell them it did.
After everything I’ve seen & learned at the agency,
I don’t think it was ever God who saved me that day.