“Come in and see! Come in and see!”

He cries out with a grin.

“Behold the ancient magic ones,

They wait for you within!”

 The paint is peeling from the door,

The glass cracked in it’s frame.

A sign above so faded that,

I can’t make out the name.

 I turn to walk away and then,

He catches at my arm.

“No charge for you today good sir,

Pray what could be the harm?”

As suddenly, the beating stops,

Now silence takes it’s place.

A moment’s warmth upon my cheek,

A breath upon my face!

 Yes, now I scream and now I run,

From what I do not know.

Just run until I cannot breathe,

No further can I go.

 The beating comes again but now,

It sounds more like a heart.

Some monster of antiquity,

Raised up by darkest art.

The Hidden God

“I only ask when you have seen,

The mysteries waiting there,

That you will tell where you have been,

And all your visions share.”

 I think that I will walk away,

But then I think, “Why not?”

I did not know, but even then,

I was already caught.

 I let the hawker guide me back,

I stand before the door.

It swings in on a squealing hinge,

Now all is dark before.

The panic comes in blinding waves,

My mind plays tricks on me.

I think I see some movement there,

And strain my eyes to see.

 I stumble forward gasping still,

Must know what horror dwells.

In such a place impossible,

The terror in me swells.

 A piping wail, a droning chant,

Now join the steady throb.

They baffle and confuse my mind,

Of me, my wits, they rob.

I’m closer now, one tentacle,

Grasps me and lifts me high.

I gibber in my terror as,

I gaze into its eye.

 I stand once more before the door,

It’s flaked and peeling paint.

Looks faintly iridescent now,

As from some demon’s taint.

 “You like the show?”, the hawker asks,

With empty holes for eyes.

“Remember you must tell your tale,

He’ll know if you tell lies.”

I step into the gloom and feel,

A moistness underfoot.

There is a smell of dank decay,

And long forgotten soot.

 The darkness fades, a lesser dark,

And now I dimly see.

I look around and realize,

There’s no door behind me.

 I’m standing in a larger space,

Than what there should have been.

Where massive shapes loom all around,

More sensed than truly seen.

I’m closer now can see for sure,

A chanting, piping crowd.

While far ahead the being whose,

Heart throbbed ungodly loud.

 Impossible! My mind screamed out,

Such things just can’t exist.

Yet every time my eyes are closed,

Those images persist.

 One hundred meters high or more,

And more than twice as wide.

A sickly iridescent gleam,

Upon its blotchy hide.

So now I know the truth of it,

I’m bait that’s why I live.

Instead of taking just my life,

Take all that I can give.

 I am a prophet of my God,

Lead others to that place.

By writing this, those fools read,

Begin to seek that space.

 If you still want to meet a God,

You’ll find a certain door.

It may not be the one I found,

There are so many more.

But just be sure and just beware,

Before you make that choice.

That if you live, you’ll be it’s slave,

Like me, its human voice.

Cheers, Winston

Perhaps the dark is caused by smoke,

An opiate I think.

Or someone slipped a mickey in,

The tea I bought to drink.

 I start to walk, to seek a wall,

A door back to the street.

And realize there is a sound,

A deep, abyssal beat.

 It is so low, more felt than heard,

It fills my soul with dread.

My every thought to scream and run,

The pounding fills my head.

A thousand grotesque tentacles,

Obscenely writhe and coil.

They crush the closest of the crowd,

Their corpses left to spoil.

 Uncounted eyes, their lidless gaze,

The windows to it’s soul.

But do not look! There’s nothing there.

A howling, sucking hole.

 I notice now I’m chanting too,

I’ve joined its soulless choir.

This endless paean to my God,

To sing my one desire.