Unseen fingers forged in the dark, in bottomless night mysterious doom, till the buzz whirled even the white noise black.

It hung above the long-grown grass, where the wolf came to sniff the gloom, stalk the shadows, gnaw futilely at metallic dusk, atomic sunrise.

The wolf snarled, My eyes gleam gold. I feast on hoarded magic, but my hunger grows. Frothy, I tread on, still warm from the hunt. I dread neither God nor man.

But violet Xerum 525 tears through bridle and bone. In the zone blood gels, flesh crystallizes— sparrows, rabbits, lilies die, and the golden eyes grow hollow, blind.

It did not hear the wolf’s howl. It did not fear the shadows. It sucked up all the magic, spinning like Mercury round the light. It tore free from its binds, testing gravity, time, leaving only scorch marks in the grass . . .

night wind
contemplating the death
of stars

Anna Cates