christ-haunted

in church today, i sit beside a man with the eyes of a snake whose head i buried in the front yard

[recsongs]

[fleshfruits]

swamp gospel is a verse novel styled as a collection of posthumously published journals, essays, and poems. underpinning the feverish narration of personal decay is a bizarre and contradictory religious dogma—informed by sufi and carmelite philosophy, and populated by figures from norse and kemetic polytheist traditions. the final contribution is an apparently authentic police report filed with the monroe county sheriff's office regarding a body discovered in highly unusual condition along a tributary to the conecuh river. failure to distinguish the unnamed, deceased narrator from the attributed author, delilah ölvaldursson, has caused some confusion. neither delilah nor the parish office have responded to requests for clarification. template credit.

[lifeinpoetry]

“If every woman has a grave deep inside her, / Then mine is my father’s”

— — Janice Lobo Sapiago, from “Being Reading,” like a solid to a shadow

[fleshfruits]

how del starts talking halfway thru a bottle of cranberry juice

[fleshfruits]

del loves meeting new ppl in no small part bc she can lie abt her familial relationships. she does this for sport

[gouged-doll]

roland barthes, a lover’s discourse

[alysmond]

OBSESSION (2026) dir. Curry Barker

[fleshfruits]

“you're right.”

blistering calm in her voice. it could be true, for all he knows. this isn't the same creature he left to its own devices those many years ago; it isn't even the girl whom he gleefully fed to her executioners, though it's taken great pains to look like her. it smiles like she always has, like it's just stumbled upon the most delectable secret.

“i almost forgot about you, like i forget about my momma sometimes.”

she makes only the slightest movement. the blade is sharpened so finely that if he's distracted enough, he might not feel it gliding through his skin.

“you ever get a little queasy when i say i'll always need you? 'cause you know better, right?”

[undeific]

She’s perfected the art of saying a lot while also saying absolutely nothing, usually his calling card. He doesn’t know whether to be flattered or vexed. He doesn’t bother lingering on either; that’s the trap, a maze of words to get lost in so you don’t notice the ground dropping out from under you.

He might be a dead man, he might not be. It’s thrilling to be on that precipice, not knowing which way it will go. The fear squirms around inside him, tickles his guts; it’s all he can do not to keel over laughing. He has enough sense to know not to move, at least. Then it would be over all too soon.

          “‘Know better?’ Know you’re full of shit, you mean?”

She hasn’t claimed to need him in ages, which might be the point she’s trying to make. At least it’s circling the drain of her point, if she really has one at all.

Apparently she did need him, though, because now at least she has fire in her eyes. A little motivation goes a long way. He thinks of the lives he traded to reignite her and then stops thinking about them, because who cares, life goes on. There’s always going to be a little boy getting shot in the back of the head somewhere.

[fleshfruits]

suppose it's true. suppose without him, her potential would be bloated and rotting beneath her childhood home. suppose that every ounce of grief and decadence she wrings from life, she does only for him to taste it; if all there is to her is thanks to him. then suppose she might've always become this thing—consumed to the point of decay by the pursuit of herself—even if they'd lived and died as strangers.

“your heart gets broken no matter what.”

and she can smell his heart now, in all its prismatic fragility. it's a wonder any beast who's had a taste ever let him live. she jerks her wrist, slicing deeper than she meant to, and quickly drops the weapon to the floor. her other hand twists into his hair, and she leans in as if to kiss him, but her teeth are all wrong and there's only blackness where her eyes had been a moment before.

“i'm so sorry, baby.”

[fleshfruits]

on your side. he's right, in a simple way, though she'd argue it's murkier than that. their favor, and the power it confers, is a game of chance as surely as it's a game of skill; the altar is no safer than the waiting jaws of a crocodile. a beast's loyalty, no matter where it may lie, can never overcome its nature.

“if i like the coffee, i'll put in a good word.”

for a day or two, the unseasonable storm will bring relief and levity to the polite, compulsory conversations between strangers. as it goes on, the working public will become more concerned with the state of the roads. after a week, news anchors will nervously banter with half-baked guesses of when things will return to normal. after the second week, there's doubtless to be millions of dollars in infrastructure damage—almost all of which could've been prevented, if only those with means had acted on the advice that's been repeated to them for half a century. and people with no culpability in those failures will die; children like caleb, children like her brother.

"were you very frightened, watching? or more... magnetized?”

[med1c1nal]

He takes his time thinking about his answer, staring at her now instead of the storm. The calm in his eyes is blemished, infected by something; gears are turning, snakes are coiling. Maybe that’s an answer in itself.

          “Both,”          he says finally. A nod. The light on the coffee machine goes green. He pours the cups. 

By now, Hyuntae has seen all manner of impossible things, but the world is rewritten completely with every discovery. It is such a strange state to be in, this constant wonder, perpetual awe. It’s disorienting. Sometimes it can be overwhelming. He’d never seen anything like that before. Of course it frightened him. But how could he look away? It exists. 

Cream and sugar are placed on the table to be taken at will. Claudette curiously and cautiously sits near Delilah, just out of reach. After delivering both coffee cups, Hyuntae follows her lead.

          “I don’t mean to sound ineloquent. But I don’t know how else to word it: What the hell happened back there?”

[fleshfruits]

trying to put the disaster into words feels clumsy, even a little insulting. were they not such perfect strangers, she might take her hand to him—a sculptor to his slab of funerary alabaster—and form the knowing herself. her eyes drift the woods, obscured now by one pale sheet of rain after another.

“i didn't know he'd come. i mean, i had an idea but i didn't know.”

when she overdosed for the first time, it took four bags of intravenous fluid before she felt like a human being again. her body was there, not quite warm under the soft blue hospital blanket, but a long, dim hall had grown between her and the sensations of living. she's grateful for the warmth of the mug.

"something terrible happened, and i want the world to stop like it did for me. i prayed for a cataclysm.”

[wickdcreatures]

⋆⁺₊⋆🪦  ⋆⁺₊ ⋆⁺₊⋆ you're  so  tired  of  this  life  /  can  i  stand  in  your  LIGHT?  /  you  don't  see  what  i  see  in  you  /  i  just  want  to  BE  WITH  YOU      [  …  ]     WICKDCREATURES: an indie  original character  HORROR  /  FOLKLORE  inspired  multimuse  written  by  specter.  DEAD  DOVE  DO  NOT  EAT.  18+

[fleshfruits]

[fleshfruits]

the odour of sanctity

borrowed from here & here

café rose, tom ford

top: turkish rose, black coffee

heart: bulgarian rose, ylang-ylang, patchouli, cardamom, coriander

base: frankincense, sandalwood

“essences of rose and dark coffee reveal sensual depth, while ylang ylang exudes an opulent floralcy. coriander, patchouli and cardamom infuse a spicy warmth to incense resin and sandalwood accords.”

incense: avignon, comme des garcons

top: frankincense, myrrh, elemi

heart: french labdanum, spices, ambrette

base: insence, olibanum, virginia cedar, chamomile, brazilian rosewood, patchouli, oak moss, vanilla, musk

“avignon is named after the city in the south of France, the Provance region. it was a very influential Catholic centre in the 14th century. this is a smell of gothic cathedrals, their vast and high halls, gobelins and tapestries that have absorbed the sacred frankincense smell for centuries.”

AlUla, penhaligon's

top: frankincense, guatemalan cardamom, black pepper

heart: plum, tobacco saffron

base: vanilla, turmeric.

“vanilla winds whisper across the horizon. plum. patchouli. palms reach skyward, taller than incense, next to a monolith of spice and tobacco. a sweeping desert of saffron, born of sand and drenched in sky.”

[undeific]

He’s already halfway through his glass of champagne, pleased that it doesn’t seem in any way drugged or poisoned. The spirit of the city—wet and hot like a lover’s mouth—encourages him to top the glass off before he’s even finished; he thinks better of it at the last minute. On her turf, he should be a little more discerning. 

Especially since she’s started to talk about weapons. Apparently there’s more on her mind than luring Izaya to a bayou death. He listens, cogs turning, trying to figure out where exactly she’s going with this. 

          “Okay,”          he finally says. He’s got nothing. If it were as simple as wanting to deal weapons, she could talk to her idiot husband and his loser friends. Clearly she's aiming beyond just that, shrouding her point in all that noise about the system.           “So you want to… what, exactly? Change the shape of the arms race? I hate to say this, but I don’t know if I can help much with that.”

[fleshfruits]

“not really, well—maybe not yet.”

the bones of the operation are already in place. he might accelerate them towards their goal, but he isn't—strictly speaking—needed, in an enterprising capacity. though in lieu of the many vices she's surrendered, he may still have occasional utility. even vanta doesn't quite scratch the itch since she returned from the desert.

the courtyard foliage droops beneath the seasonal damp, a near perfect canopy on all sides camouflaging them from the prying eyes of god and other patrons. the bamboo stalks and palm leaves bend, it seems, in her direction. slowly, almost imperceptibly, the kudzu colonizing the weathered brick walls begins to multiply.

“i thought you might like a demonstration. chimeric weapons are rare, even to myth. i know your headless ride sort of has one—but that's just her body, isn't it? not two alchemically separate objects.”

[seidkonaz]

if you dont like this it wasnt me & i don't know her. if you do like it im taking full credit

[undeific]

Izaya follows her gaze to the floor, trying to untangle the peculiar feeling in his guts, his throat. There is nothing to suggest he’s come home to a crime scene—Delilah wouldn’t have bothered to clean up the evidence if it were—but it feels that way regardless. He laughs, partially to expel the coiled energy, partially at the absurdity of his own unease. 

          “We both married icy blondes. Her name’s Tem.”          He says it with all the cool detachment one would expect.          “Shinra’s dad wanted me to look out for her. She’s Nebula property.” 

There’s an unpleasant scent lingering beneath the disinfectant, bitter and organic, fetid. Vomit? 

          “As for begging, I take it you’re talking about the knife? She was giving me the cold shoulder for a while, so I was making a statement. ‘Don’t make me beg for attention. Don’t make me beg for forgiveness.’”          He waves his hand dismissively.          “Was she here? She plays tough but she’s got the constitution of a little baby fawn. You didn’t scare her, did you?” 

[fleshfruits]

the eager heat of spring fogs the windows, crowding into the backseat of the cab. the driver's face doesn't show his age but streaks of silver at the temples give him away. he's watching them like he knows something they don't. delilah leans close to her lover—suggestive, but not near enough to touch. three hours from now, when the doctor arrives to peel him off the pavement, she'll witness him defenseless in the face of his most tender resentment: it should've been me. when they're not looking, she'll take sacrament from the blood-dampened asphalt.

the driver says something in japanese that sends izaya into a fit.

“what's so funny?”

“he asked if we're married, he said you talk like my wife.”

"you're kidding, right?"

she'll tell him later, intoxicated of her own cruelty while he's too delirious to protest, what must've been the truth, even if only in that moment,“yeah baby, i'll marry you.”

she unravels against his shoulder with a sob, as she's done so very many times, but it isn't like before—how could it be? nothing now can pass between them without bearing the mark of two point-blank nine millimeter exit wounds.

eventually she regains enough of her breath to choke out, “i don't know—not on purpose.”

[fleshfruits]

butdo u. do u care her

[seidkonaz]

you nearly drowned inside my holy water