Bloodhound

I am the bloodhound. The sticky red nectar of the gods rushing through me, pulsating, I am bloody, I am a walking totem of blood and guts, a tribute to those before me, an effigy of creation, a failure to survival without the sweet, sweet blood of my life. 

The bags under my eyes, purple like beaten plums, scrape along the pavement like some unholy chains from a ghost lost among the terrace, eyes scanning the weeds, looking for betrayal, looking for forgiveness, forgive this, oh those who have wandered too close to the trees, too far into the gaping maw of vines and leaves, don't leave us here. 

My chains, like loose nooses, ravage the dirt and when they strike the concrete leave glowing white tally marks of my many body counts. White is so pure, white is so sharp. White canines ripping and tearing the iridescent flesh of a thrashing snake apart. Back and forth it wrestles, with saliva slicked skin, it fights so hard for freedom not knowing that I have tasted my bottom fangs and enjoyed the splendorous and sonorous sensation of warm essence on a cold and brazen soul. 

Pounding on the stones, a distant snarl, an unforeseen roar, traipsing among the bricked rose garden until the dust rises from the graves and swirls about the moonless sky, no shadow only the smell of rot. 

The best bloodhounds are blind. They are less than thou but better. They can smell your agony and they will hunt you down. They do not have the speed of a springer nor the barbarity, the humanity of a german shepard, but they have the hunt, they have the dedication, dead in the night they will find your wasted breath and gnash at your heels, so stupid you are to be out at night when I the bloodhound seeks to make things right. 

Bleeding hearts that open at night, trees when slashed that bleed righteous blood, dripping, sweating, let it pour from my temples, I am not finished with this fight yet. I will bellow and crawl and tear down your walls until you are nothing more than innocent blood yourself. How wicked of me to do what I have never not known how to do. 

Lap up my sweet words as your cuts burn and ooze and I know you're waiting for the salt to come because that's who we've become.