The Devil by Golnoosh Nour

I had this dream years ago: there was you

and silence. I don’t recall much else, but I

do remember my brother’s interpretation,

which was correct; in my unconscious, I see you

as the devil. And it’s true I have loved many

a demon, but none with eyes like yours:

Jet black almonds, coal volcanos.

Now we are both damaged goods, lachrymose

and far far apart. But the thought of you

is still a weapon I worship. In another lifetime,

I wrote you were trying to be the devil, but I

always saw the weeping saint.

In the words of Crowley:

You are an angel with rainbow wings

Even your sadism was tender

I was your Abraham, I had to sacrifice you

in order to reach God. And now we know there

is no God – only demons, but we love them all.

Tonight, as I sit in the dark moonlight, all the knights

fall off my hands onto the bed. I think of my new demonic

interest: a sickly man with Plutonic eyes who lies to me

and his wife. Every night, he wears a scarlet skirt and fists

my mirrors. He speaks our language, literally and metaphorically

he knows how it feels to be from that country.

He has that curse. The curse that looks like

a beautiful face and ancient lyricism, but eats

you like a surreptitious snake. But is it even a curse?

To be this broken. To know this brokenness.

After all, you said our profane country purifies

everyone and you were never wrong.

______________

Golnoosh Nour is an Iranian-British poet, fiction writer, and educator. Her debut short story collection, The Ministry of Guidance was shortlisted for the Polari Prize in 2021, and her debut poetry collection Rocksong was shortlisted for the Polari Prize in 2022. Her work has also appeared in Granta, Columbia Journal, and the Penguin/Vintage Anthology 100 Queer Poems.