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Monster

I was a zygote then—
a coin in my mother’s purse,
a fish, swimming in the brine

of her sins. I was the tiny monster 
growing inside her, always 
needing, always reaching.

Then, swaddled in my disfigured armor,
I howled and squirmed. Priests 
and soothsayers were summoned
with their incantations and blessings.
But the monster lived, consumed our lives, 
and became something other –
a manifestation of our fears.

On rainy nights when the roof leaked,
when the bills piled up, nights I lay 
in the hospital waiting for X-rays or surgery,
the monster’s shadow stained the walls.

Sometimes I imagined he was a warden 
locking the doors. Sometimes he was the doctors, 
with their tiny knives and mouse-black eyes. 
Sometimes I swear he was God.
Jason Irwin, "Monster" from A Blister of Stars. Copyright © 2016 by Jason Irwin.  Reprinted by permission of Jason Irwin.
Source: A Blister of Stars (Low Ghost Press, 2016)