Crooked

It was built wrong

Not poorly constructed

Its angles were minatory

Malevolent

Something cruel

In the crossing of those lines

If a home has a soul

This one weighs heavy with sin

But this is a house

No one lives here

Could exist here

In this unheimlich domum

And yet

I call this my heart

The place I return to each day

And I patrol its halls alone

I would not inflict

Not force upon another human

This awful sight

This odd angled room

This crooked house

Mirrors

My head is swimming

Swirling fever high

Eyes lolling tilting

Shifting with the floor

Staggered steps lead out

Slippered not slipping

Into the bathroom

I grip counter

And shake my head

My body shakes

Slowly I look up

Meeting my bloodshot gaze

I smile despite myself

Toothy and glib

What do I have to smile about

I’m not smiling at all

The fever dream feel of it

Subsumes my senses

I begin to talk

“Let it take you

Let the fever consume you

A fire within

Burning away your mind

The doctor’s far too expensive

And really what could he do?”

I nod slowly

And my reflection nods with me

A Nicholson like grin

Stretching cheeks and skin

I lower my head in the sink

And turn on the water

I’ll feel fine

Tomorrow

Dolls

A standing layer of dust

Covered every inch

Of every surface

And as I perused slowly

The smell curled and soured

The scent of abandonment

I ran a finger over glass

Cabinets laden with antiques

The dust piling under my touch

Something stirred within

I stopped

And leaned in close

Porcelain placid face

Stared out at me

Hand held up

And beckoning

Then her mouth

Twisted slowly

Into smile

Teeth shimmering in the dark

Human teeth

Children’s teeth…

I should have ran

But I stood

Frozen by fear

As the doll stood up

Pressing forehead to glass

A crack appeared

Down its head

Slowly spreading

Then opening

The jagged edges

Lined with yet more teeth

And within

Something fleshy

And quick

Pressed into the glass

Sucking

Needy

Hungry

I awoke screaming

On the floor

Of that self same shop

And readied myself

For yet one more pass

The fear repeating over again

Just as acute

Just as sharp

Silent

The books were lined perfectly along their shelves

Battlements of knowledge

An army of thoughts

I eased my way between the stacks

Careful with each footfall

Paying heed the warnings given

“Oh sure plenty of value to be found there

In thought or coin the library’s a trove

Though…

You must be quiet…”

I slid past adult fiction

Approaching the archive and rare books

I held my backpack before me

Hands gripping the tools within tight

No jingle or rattle would I allow escape

The cabinet stood before me

Cracked leather spines

Cloth worn down to wood

Each one worth enough to feed me for months

Gently I set the backpack down

Undoing the strap which held it closed

I lifted from within my lock pick set

With nimble fingers I tested the size of the lock and tumblers within

When satisfied I began gently lifting and testing each one

Finding the order in which to move them

And the height at which they caught

A smile broke over my face

As I managed the final tumbler

Slowly

Carefully

I turned the lock

Then

click

It turned and opened for me

I had a sack within my backpack

Which I then pulled out

And with greatest care

Lowered the tomes within

A bible

Illuminated and gilded

A Tree of Codes

Barely held together

On the Origin of Species

Signed too infact

creeeeak

Behind me

I didn’t look

I simply grabbed my bag

And ran

Ran with all my might

Behind me something hissed

Serpentine

But footfalls crashed as it followed

Barreling ever closer

I felt the breath

Its labored heat

The doors but feet away

The moment I passed the threshold

The sound stopped

Replaced instead

By churring crickets

And a gentle breeze

Which were quick drowned out

By my own panting

Keeled over

And clutching my books

Months of food

Waiting to be traded

Thumbnail Source: https://andriishafetov.artstation.com/projects/Pe6bZ

Elsewhere North

Belabored breath

I can barely breath

Legs peddling

Slow

But steady

Whirring gearbox

Transforming my life

To energy

So we might heat our hearth

For another day

“Our” is maybe generous

Food is provided me

And water too

I share in the heat

But

I cannot stop

They will not let me

Me and all the others

Taking shifts

Endless toil

And look how they lounge

And love

And live in sweet bliss

The guard can see

I am on my last legs

But instead

Of allowing me a respite

I feel a jab

From his long handled pike

“Faster you dog…”

He growls venomously

I begin to cry

Make sure to go check out Ameberley’s After the End poem for today over here! If you liked these then you can read all of the poems in our collections After the End and the hashtag AftertheEnd

Water

He was a sailor

Debonair and beguiling

All crisp lines and square jaw

All ladies fell for him

I fell alike

He would never shoot me

Even the side longest of glances

I found myself lost in the crowd

His pure apathy

No rejection

Mere refusal of existence

Drove me to it

To that most desperate of actions

Cliffs bare

Waves wide

I fell

He never knew

Away he went atop the ocean

That bore my body

And one night a storm struck

With all the fury my despair might muster

The waves washed over him

Pulling him overboard

And I

I was waiting

Far below

Dirt

I stretched my toes

Feeling the soil spread beneath them

Slowly I closed my eyes

Easing a breath from my lungs

Was I truly ready for what I’d find?

For what it would show me?

No

But no one could truly be prepared

I knelt and with a black bladed knife

Carved an eye into the dirt

Then pressed the point of the dagger into my thumb

dripping a few drops of scarlet blood upon the mound

The frimament began to shift

Quaking in excitement as a low rumbling took up

Then the eye I had drawn

Blinked

As it opened the loam fell away

Down into the earth

I lowered my face to this hole

And stared back into the eye

Black nothing greeting me

Then a distant light

Sparkling

Shimmering in the dim

It was magnificent

Horrible

Awful

Terrible

Everything which had died

Or will die

The churning mass of souls

Which comprised the earth

The lives we walked upon daily

Without thought

They looked up at me

And screamed their truth

“The final life

The ultimate form

Of all that is

Or shall be

Is simply the dirt

And that which lives within”

Space

Retrofuturism

Jokingly referring to those classics

Alien and such

Green CRTs displaying text and vector images

Simple yes?

The only way we would have enough space

For AI

I don’t laugh now as I stare at response

She generated

“Requesting distress signal deployment”

“Request denied”

I type furiously keyboard clacking

“Inquiry: why”

Pause as she thinks but a moment and a half

possibilities considered

“Primary objective: Protect Qiang Corp. Assets”

“Crew not labeled Assets”

“If crew expires before aid arrives at our location”

“Ship shall be salvaged”

“Qi, AI, I shall be salvaged and placed upon new ship”

“Qi is Asset, Ship is Asset”

“Your need to harm Qiang Corp. Assets requires your removal”

I hear door lock engage

“Venting contaminated air in 3… 2… 1…”

Box

Mom kept it at the back of the closet

The one that curved beneath the stairs

She caught me trying to open it once

Tanned my hide for that…

Just a dumb box

What’s wrong with it?

But it was halloween

She thought I was out

Trick or treating with my friends

I crouched low beneath the steps

Squeeze charged flashlight in hand

Pumping slow and steady to keep it lit

There it sat

Brown and plain

No markings

No indication of contents

I kneeled and slid forward

The cape of my batman costume dragging

The world’s greatest detective…

I reached it and slowly grasped its sides and pulled it out a bit

I held the light in one hand, still pumping away

And with the other I eased open the unsecured lid

Nothing was inside

No not an empty box

Nothing

I saw nothing

Black

Endless

Nothing

The inside edges of the box were there

But where the bottom should be

Nothing

I didn’t get it

I couldn’t get it

I still don’t

My hand shook as I slowly eased my flashlight down into the box

Passing the floor and dangling it in the void below

The light dimmed

battery draining quickly

I heard something

Deep and low

Predatory

My body jumped

And the light fell

Fell

So far

Then nothing

Gone without a trace

I slowly closed the lid

Slid it back

And never spoke of it again…

Thumbnail source: https://www.deviantart.com/jusdog/art/The-Scary-Box-449433139

Answered

I stood at the edge

Overlooking the bay

Wind whipped me

As it had my love

I had called on the gods

I had begged

Pleaded

And the gods?

They were silent

My only recourse

My only relief

Those stones

And white foam waves below

 

I had walked from the town

Leaving Lucius to his trading

Wheeling and dealing

Trees so tall

They must scrape the sky

Leaving those vaporous trails behind

All around me they spoke

Wind whispering something quiet

I listened

 

My toes felt the edge

Tested the balance

The feel of the stone

 

I followed a path

Beat low by many feet

But I felt drawn beside

 

I lifted my arms

“What now?

What say you?!”

The silence was deafening

 

A shout so loud

And resonant it bounded

I ran to it

The distress too clear

 

I closed my eyes

Leaned forward

 

I leapt

Arms out

 

The world turned over

And felt the brush scratch at me

What had happened

I was not falling

I was tumbling

Who?

 

I held out my arm

Trying to break the fall

We hit a hill

And rolled roughly

 

We stopped

 

We opened our eyes

 

And he said

 

“Heya…

I’m Michael…

My friends call me Minos”