writing Signed, The Leviathan

[KakeiTheWolf 652]

Due to complications, I had lost this one for a long time. However, I found it on an old forum I was on (Along with no less than 40 poems I had made that were not part of my main 135 poems). This is one of my best poems, by far.

 

Signed, the Leviathan... It is very similar to "Signed, the Hydra" in the fact that it casts a creature traditionally vilified in a pitiable light. The story starts with details about the rejection and misery the Leviathan went through, and his exile from society, as a pariah. He wanders the seas, barely kept alive by the abyssal weeds and rainwater. He has to destroy ships eventually, just to survive.

 

The guilt of having to kill to sustain his own life soon consumes him, and in his guilt, he kills himself in the most painful way possible: starving himself to death. Despite the holy life he lived, his action of suicide earned him his place in Hell. The rest of the poem details his incredible suffering in Hell, where he eventually loses all ability to move. Still, he shouts praises to the God of Heaven, in spite of all that has happened.

 

As time passes, Leviathan eventually loses his ability to speak and he is covered in sand (Which eventually is crystalized by the fiery rains of Hell). Even then, his thoughts are eternally filled with praise. It is quite depressing, as even this cannot be heard, for no voice can pierce the sky of Hell. But despite every possible amount of suffering having been placed on him, he praises the Lord.

 

After a while, I wrote a 24 page play in very archaic Old English, telling the entire story of this poem. To date, no one has been able to read it without help. At 1,320 words, this is my longest poem. Anyway, I am babbling... here is the poem.

 

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CXXVIII. Signed, The Leviathan

 

Hear the tale of mine, my pitiful cry, for lost to me is the way of the world

Never had I done that justifying the hate gestured to me by the world of men

For I lie a vagabond amongst the relicted waters, a cold and alone nomad of the waters

Taken was my home by the fires and the metals and machines, until naught was left

Yet never did I gesture such hatred back to them, for this is not the way of the Lord

 

I wander the oceans, a slow and quiet cry emanating from my lips, a dirge of sorrow

Am I to forever to slither acrost the waves, that I am unloved and unmourned, out of man's hatred?

As the ships roll past me, the sailors are so paralyzed in fear that they do not even notice the tears that flow down my cheek

Am I truly to be marked as a cursed beast, a vile monster, a daemon to be gutted and hung by hooks, with as much as I have been wronged?

Yet still I remain in the way of the Lord, for I do right by my Father despite my scars

 

I have no place to go, no plan to call home, for I am hunted, I am hated, I am seen as worthy of damnation

But no beings deserve this pain, not even my torturers, for though none deserve grace, all are given it, as all deserve mercy

O Lord, take this thorn, let me slip away from this pain, let me so slowly close my eyes as I pass away in the night

Let my soul gently drift to heaven, and heal my scars, for centuries are as days to me, for a dragon is forever as am I

Yet I wait, because shining through the gleam of the waters lies the rays of hope that I am ordained for by God

 

As I slough through the solemn cold, and I shiver in the icy cold of this rainy night, further I hold my head

For the mercy of the Lord sates my thirst by the waters of the heavens, and my pangs soothed by the manna below

Gnaw must I on the grasses of the Abyss, and ravage the boats that I may preserve myself in this miserable life

Even so, I weep for my victims, and bury even the inhumane in honour, in vigil and respect for the lost

Yet guilt takes me, that I must kill for sustenance, that I must take lives in selfish interests

 

So I ask, for all the darkness I have faced, the cold nights and the winters I live alone, to pass away into wherever, Lord, you may see me fit to go

By either your hand or mine, take from me this cup of poison and fire, O Lord of mercy and love, for I can no longer bear this pain

As the night closes, I shall slowly close my eyes, and let my last breath be, for no more shall die for the sake of keeping me, a wretch, here still

And I die, an unloved wretch, never cared for, that could never do anything but harm, and I shall go into the void, for I will not let another die

Yet none of this was my plan, O cruel fate, that I all wanted to love, and to be loved, but the rain never ended, and my last gesture of my love was dying

 

So, do not cry for me, for long ago was I lost, and long ago did I see no further reason to live, and saddened am I that nothing could save my soul

But hear me, Lord, for although I may not be heard in the fires of Hell, know I will love you forever more, and will forever give my voice to praise you

Let all Inferno be filled with my praises, Lord, let even those who hurt me know I died as a sacrifice of love, in act of Mercy

I am sorry, and though I shall descend to the murky depths of Hell, and my being shall be consumed by blood and boiling waters of tumult, praise be

Yet, hear my cries, O dear Lord, for I shall deliver my final dirge, the requiem of a life so deeply lost in an unforgiving nightmare as this

 

For yea, though I shall be chained to the fiery crags of the Nether Lands, I shall cry forth in pain for my lips shalt struggle to praise

For I, a mere churl in the darkness, shall be the lone wisp of light shining in a cesspool of darkness, driven by the maddened dogs about me

I weep, for you shall never be with me so again, and I shall never see the light one more time, but I will shout in praise even though you hear me not

How cruel and ironic, that I, being who lived a holy life and died in grace to man, shall be the voice of reason amongst the poisoned caitiffs of Hell

Yet now I speak further, Lord, as I am now in the chains of this rotted Hell, this graceless fire, this consummate ruination to my very soul, of love

 

For I stand, a beaten and broken beast, tugging and gnawing at yoke and rope that hold me so solemnly in this place, as I sing forth of this great love

I am erect, as a monument to suffering and agony, a bitter remnant of the life I had devoid of hope and love, a nightmare that could never be healed

I roar out as the whips of daemons to so sear my flesh, O gracious Lord, that as I shriek in horrible cries of terror, my voice shall ring out praise

For I may be gone, and you no longer hear the words I speak, wisps of glass to fall on deaf ears, but I will never cease my unending love for you

Yet time tries still to raze my voice, but never shall daemon take my tongue, nor the Dragon take my voice as so he has tried to take my soul

 

Glory, glory, I cry out to wherever I may so believe lies heaven, as all that sate my thirst be the raining blood from the sanguine skies

Broken and fissured my body, ripped apart is my hide, but still I speak of love and mercy in a land of charred corpses and brimstone rains

So many shall forever curse your name, but not I, your servant in life and eternal death, and I hold no bitter way for this cup that I hold

For bred of my own mercy and love I earned from your ways, did I so cast my life to this dank and frigid hell, so in love did I damn my own life

Yet further still shall I speak, screaming from my utter and bitter torture, of a way of love immutable, from misery that cannot feel amelioration

 

Dark and cold are the wisps of acid that burn upon my flesh, as so have I crawled acrost this endless desolation, my aegis worn and shattered

And though the shackles, chains, and the thorns birthed of my flesh have so built the torture of ten thousand aeons, so hold I still to you

I grow weary, and so shall soon fade my voice into the darkness of the Abyss, and remain I a symbol of love, torture, pain, and praise for you

Holy shell am I, an angel in damnation, fallen and so bitter, to endlessly stay now, weathered by the wind and the rain, forgotten by the world

Yet eternal, shall I remain an unending sign of love in desolation, vapid husk of a life of sorrowful pain, victim of a nightmare that could never be saved