Monster Movie

She dipped her hands into the boiling lead of his heart
--The sound of a moon-mad coyote--
And they came out disfigured, molded to one another,
Encased in a glowing shell which quickly hardened
And grew dark again; the burning smell was inescapable
And clotted in their nostrils. Her tears scored his cheeks with acid intaglio.
Bare and small, she was a small red seed,
Earth-driven and bird-shy, roe of rhododendron,
And he enjoyed her ridged smoothness between his incisors;
The satisfying, subdued snip as she broke in half; then he
Used his fingernails to dislodge bits of her that had become stuck in his molars,
Rolling, for a few moments, these final fragments
Between tongue and teeth, like a jaguar playing with a peccary,
Before consigning them to his endless esophagus;
And when he awoke his body was covered in scales.