Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash
I received a letter in looping,
girlish cursive, informing me
I had been chosen as the monster's
next lover. My womb bounded
like a hart, like a striped gazelle.
The monster hid in a beautiful body,
and I had loved him all my life.
*
Some monsters are obvious,
like the man born
with a fully functional penis
on the back of his head,
which, when erect, stood
like a unicorn's horn.
*
My fingers gritty with glitter,
I read the instructions given
by the monster's last lover.
Hit him with a wrench,
she told me, Break his toes.
She signed the letter, Love,
but it didn't sound like love
to me.
*
Some monsters find monstrosity
useful, such as the man
who instead of a thumb
had a second, smaller hand.
He learned guitar, had one
custom-made with strings
on both sides. He doubled
his melody, became a duet.
*
The monster's lover enclosed
photos, glitter-bombed and gleeful.
One was of her inner forearm,
blue-black bruises blooming
down the length of it,
overlapping circles,
like multiple bites.
In the next photo, she had
glitter-penned his name
over her pain.
*
Sometimes monsters
look like ordinary men.
John Wayne Gacy smiled
and sillied at charitable events
as Patches the Clown.
Twenty-six young men
were found buried
in the crawlspace of his house.
*
I had a horror before me:
her bruises, her book
of his delights.
I had an honor before me:
I'd been chosen, somehow,
by the monster himself,
and his pull is like the earth
to the moon; we lovers,
we survivors, circle him,
circle him, in adoration and awe.
Mary Ann Honaker is the author of It Will Happen Like This (YesNo Press, 2015) and Becoming Persephone (Third Lung Press, 2019). Her poems have appeared in Bear Review, Drunk Monkeys, Euphony, Juked, Little Patuxent Review, Rattle.com, Sweet Tree Review, Van Gogh’s Ear, and elsewhere. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart prize. Mary Ann holds an MFA in creative writing from Lesley University. She currently lives in Beaver, West Virginia.