The Werewolf

Dated 1859, 6 August

They are coming. I can feel it in my blood. They are coming for me tonight.

This god-forsaken curse is killing me. What have I become? What is happening to me? With each passing of the moon, these desires become stronger within me. I cannot resist any longer. The lust of blood, of sweet, raw flesh is controlling me. I cannot change what I have become—a killer, a criminal. A monster.

I can hear them now. They come to kill the murderer. To bring this land justice against the evil that has occurred here. Yet I can smell their fear, their, passion, their hate. But even now, as the stench of their blood fills my senses, they are damning me to the very pits of hell that spawned me.

The lust grows. It is burning within me. Release me of this pain! Quench my anguish! But no. No one answers. Except for the beast that stirs inside of me. It yearns to be loosed, to kill, to taste the blood of those that wish to destroy me! My control over this is weakening. Stop, my treacherous heart! Let me die here rather than suffer the abomination that is set within me!

They come. The fools! Do they not know what lies in the shadows? Can they not see my damning curse for what it is?

My hands, they shake and quiver. The change, it is happening. My body is contorted into this ravenous monster; I lose myself within the wolf of my heart.

They are too late! The beast is loosed, their fates sealed forever. The anticipation of their blood in my mouth, the pleasure of their anguished deaths. What is conscience, murderous heart? What is love, life, and soul? These words are strange against my ear, only the Lust is known in my mind.

They come too late. They come with the hopes of slaying the terror that dwells amongst them. Fools, all of them. Do they not know what I am? They are ignorant of this fact:

They can not win against me!

"There is a wolf in me...fangs for tearing gashes...a red tongue for raw meat...and the hot lapping of blood - I keep this wolf because the wilderness gave it to me and the wilderness will not let it go."

--Carl Sandburg, "Wilderness"