Davide Nixon

I’m Afraid of Monsters

You have a beautiful singing voice,
but I can’t hear you over the screaming.
This is not theatrical-
these are gigantic women that rape men
of their emotions-
and gigantic men-
men as large as couches-
they devour women-
swallow them whole
like the goa
of ambitious pythonesque
middleclass monsters
out for a bit of fun.
They killed your parents.
They ate the titan girls.
They killed their own children-
at least according to gossip…
at least according to the wolves.
But who can trust those old whores?
They run with hawks
that see everything
but feel nothing.
Good god-
what a dream!
What is this fear of nightmares?
And you can’t even breathe 
with your dusty lungs
full of ants,
and termites,
full of fears 
you can no longer express,
because the child in you
was eaten alive
by a Medusa
driving around
in a beautiful new car-
Hallelujah!

How proud they sit
in their rusty cages-
the dogs with their 
cancerous fleas
have been locked
in with the lions.
These are not 
the brazen beasts from fairy tales-
lies to make children sleep well.
No- these are putrid
down to dirt earth snakes-
white eyed,
no slit
for the trusting-
no heart for the loving-
no warmth for the soul.

These are nightmares incarnate.
You’re not afraid 
because you love them.
You adore the spiny worms
in the ground
that eat your children
in their practice coffins.
They bundle like infant weasels
waiting like buffets
for creatures
of very little wit
but very large ambitions.

Are you uncomfortable with all of this?
These are the monsters that you love.
They eat your parts when you sleep
and you don’t say a fucking word
because these creatures…
they take care of you.

You are the pet of dead-eyed apes
with the brains of frog kings
and the guts of stray insects
that feed birds too fat to fly,
and speak to you in your nightmares-
and tell you how much they miss you-
how much they miss looking into your eyes.