poem that is so so so not about those roman fuckers i prommy

tgis is kinda silly but im always and foreever losing my mind abt octavian and agrippa and i love writing awful cliche poetry with too many cannibalism thoughts and dog thoughts so so much pleaaaseeee take it please please please please plea-

if i can get at least one person to look up marcus agrippa i think my job here is done. anyway this is the philippi poem ever. octavian was in his little bed because he was so so sickly and agrippa was tending to him. source is..... pliny probably? and suetonius :3. anyway. take Them. 

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drenched in scarlet yet to be spilled, 

your hands shake. more than his. you’re scared. 

it’s stupid, really, isn’t it? to be so scared for such a man. there’s nothing special about him, 

no reason you should care whether he lives or dies, 

other than the fact he is the sun. 

son.

sun.

there's no difference, not anymore.

you stupid dog, 

there is a thin line drawn in blood between devotion and obsession,

loyalty and love,

and you should not cross it. you should not want to cross it.

a fat bead of sweat rolls down his temple as he cries out. he is shaking. he is dying. 

let him. it would be better that way, wouldn’t it? 

better to watch as his skin pales, his limbs go limp, his cries fall silent. 

better to watch as those constellations you have found etched onto every inch of his skin, 

engraved into his skull, tattooed over his heart, finally blink out. 

leave him. either he will not live to see the dawn break, 

or he will be the dawn breaking, or he is only hours away from killing 

the last shard of hope that the dawn has left to spear the endless night with. 

you stupid dog. there is no going back now. 

you have found a pretty monster to pledge yourself to, haven’t you? 

golden curls, very pretty, fanned out on the pillow. like a halo. like he’s gone already.

but you can see the blood caked under his fingernails still, 

you can hear the screams of those he has butchered. those you have butchered, you 

idiot, why didn’t you stop him? it’s because you’re a loyal little bitch, isn’t it? 

you always come back when he calls you to heel. you are the one with the teeth,

tearing and biting and ripping a blood-soaked path to empire for him to walk.

you could kill him. 

put a stop to all this. it would be a mercy, really - he’s already half-dead. 

take that pillow. smother him. he’ll smother himself if you won’t, 

drowning under the weight of his own ambition. 

hurry up and do it! you wouldn’t have to see his eyes, then, 

and his pleading would be muffled, and you wouldn’t have to hear 

as he chokes on his honeyed words, 

unfulfilled promises too sweet, sticking in his throat. 

but you can’t. can you? because you love him.

i’ll say it if you won’t. you love him, you stupid dog, because who wouldn’t? 

he’s perfect, isn’t he? or maybe you're just blind. blind and weak, 

bound to crumble at the slightest touch of his hand, the gentlest word, the softest command. 

weak. poison in your mind. 

your hands grip his wrists as he thrashes, muscles spasming,

yelling wordlessly. and then your fingers are down his throat, his teeth biting into your skin

as you try to stop his own tongue from suffocating him. this is the closest you’ll ever get, 

something inside you realises. the closest you’ll get to being inside him. 

and you want to kill that part of you, kill it dead because you are not so depraved, are you,

to be thinking such things at a time like this?

but you are.

you are a savage at heart. at least, that's what they say.

a beast at his command, a monster born backward, clawing its way up from the dirt. 

you will always be his dog,

nothing more, nothing less. left begging for scraps

as he sets his sights on greater things than you. 

he coughs around your hand and you feel him hack up blood,

coating your fingers with the stuff. lick it. it's the closest you'll get to tasting him. 

and that way there will be a part of him in you forever. if he is the sun

you are his moon, his mirror, his shade, a pale reflection of his grandeur.

you stare at the blood on your fingers and wonder how the son of a god could be so fragile,

so human.

stupid dog. even gods cannot escape their flesh unless you eat it for them. 

and he has eaten, yes, he has already eaten,

picked dry the bones of a dictator and vomited forth a half-digested image of the divine.

just a taste. he won't mind. 

a finger pressed to your lips. the tang of iron. blood of heroes, blood of tyrants, 

blood of kings.

his breathing softens, eyes opening, pale and blue and scared,

and there is an ache in your chest that you cannot quite place.

he says your name, a prayer whispered from his lips, and you shatter.

weak.

he does not love you, not like you love him. but he needs you.

and that is close enough, isn't it?

so you hold his hands, small and mortal, and the dawn does not break. not today.

today, it dies, a little more than a hundred metres away from you,

speared on its own sword and gushing yet more scarlet onto hands unclean.

stupid dog. dawn dies with you.