Poe's Black Crow

It crushes my bones with peine forte et dure. It places me in a premature grave and forces me to file my nails down to the bloody bone in an attempt to escape what has already been sentenced to the finality of death. The ground has swallowed me whole and I am stuck inside the belly of the beast. Unsure of how much time has elapsed since I have been entombed, the kinks in my neck and needles poking into my muscles give me the faintest idea, though no exact measurement of time is apparent. I blink into the endless darkness before me. My blind eyes attempt to make sense of the undefined space in which I find myself. More time passes, determined by the intensifying pain that continues to invade my body, and I suddenly inhale relief as the walls that have been contorting my limbs begin to expand, and the darkness suddenly possesses more depth and mystery than it did before. I cannot decide whether I prefer the claustrophobia of confinement or the vast unknown cavity of nothingness that now stretches out before me.

Doves fly overhead and settle down on the pavement. They travel in groups and flaunt their feathers to passersby. People stop and look, some even take photographs, and marvel at the glorious sight before their eyes. Some of the prettiest doves, the ones whose eyelashes flutter seductively with every blink, entertain for sport, and the attention is like currency to them. Pigeons watch from the power lines above, chirping in hopes that they will be noticed. But the doves never look up. I watch the scene unfold from behind a trash bin and the shadows of the alleyway conceal me so my voyeurism can continue undisturbed. Nobody could ever look at me the way they look at those doves, so blessed by their genetic makeup and quite aware of it. If unconcealed from my hiding spot, my presence would come, at first, as a pleasant surprise since seeing me is as rare as a comet lighting up the night sky. But that will be before the shock sets in and all of the dark thoughts inevitably creep into their minds. Reminded of the superstitious stories they've been told about creatures like me since the beginning of time, they'll run away—fly away—leaving me to my own ill-fated devices.

I deliver the bad news. I bring about the tumultuous winds of the hurricane. I am the faceless fear that haunts the dimmest corners of your mind. The figure that catches your eye in the darkness of your bedroom that you swear is just a pile of clothes in daylight? Yeah, it's me. (Now go back to sleep.) You'll find me in the deepest wells and cavernous openings in the crest of the Earth where the darkness is disorienting, and your senses forget what it was ever like to see an incredible crimson sunset or hear birds sing their melodious morning songs. You'll forget what it was like to walk on a beach, the wind in your hair, freedom in your heart, sand between your toes, and a body of water stretched out in front of you promising new landscapes to be discovered. The beauty of nature is tainted when I appear at your feet to rest my wings from laborious flight. All that is pleasant is sucked into a black hole of never-ending nothing, and all that is left is me—the Black Crow—beckoning you to come inside (the water is fine).

When I settle in for the night and tell myself that the horrors of the day are behind me, the nightmares prove that the wretchedness will never end and no escape, not even the warm embrace of sleep, could ever prevent fate from playing out its cruel inevitability.

Woe is me.

(Poe is me.)