Through the cracked visor, the world warps—
a funhouse mirror of ruin.
Behemoth coils across the horizon,
talons raking earth’s bones.
Houses exhale splintered beams;
chimneys thrust skyward: cenotaphs of ash.
A spitting snake spits water like a futile prayer.
Behemoth laughs, licking sky with molten tongues,
flame fingers peeling bark from the world.
Wind carries its sulfur hymn,
venom curdling my lungs.
A stag bolts, trailing ribbons of burning fur.
A dog circles, tail charred to bone.
A hawk flares, a comet unraveling
into the ashen sky.
Earthworms writhe upward—
blind prophets shriveling in heat.
Minutes stretch like molten glass.
I breathe poison, lungs filling with shadow.
Behemoth whispers:
“This is the end.
Join me. Let your marrow blaze.”
Its laughter shatters steel,
a symphony of collapsing propane and flame.
I am dead.
Hell is not below.
It is here,
its gates wide open.
A black fist of smoke grabs me,
plunging me into oblivion.
I wake to broken air,
fire leering at the horizon,
its glow a smear of wrath.
I see hell from here,
its borders etched in ember.
The hose trembles in my hand,
a weak weapon against a god of ruin.
I kneel, coughing ash.
But still, I rise.
Still, I aim the serpent’s sputtering head.
Still, I fight the devil in the flames.
