The night, bleak and despairing, falls around you.  Lightless as a winter storm, no hope, no port can be found.  Shadows of people and places flash behind your eyes, and you find yourself wandering, not through the fog upon the land, but instead through the bleak gray that floats, stagnant in your mind.  The dark shallows of your own self pull you deeper into your own pity, as you flit from hateful memory to hateful memory.   Imagery falls upon your tattered remains as you wither away in the same putrid sludge that brought you into existence, images of yourself trying to be what you are not, attempting, pitifully, to “fit in”. 

            The days wasted, as you sat, empty shell hiding the truth, amongst those who were “correct”, and “right”.  The antics which they attempted, simply to prove they were “cool”, and “original”, and the laughter which roared deep within your soul, burning to be released, as you watched on, and cheered at the right times.  The baiting of those not like the chosen, yet so like your self, the self you refuse to admit lest you be one of the outcasts, using words and false bravado to drop them to a level below, placing those who have made your live a living damnation in a position elevated, a place of “power”.

            These memories weigh upon your soul, dragging you deeper into the husk that you once were, and bring, weeping to the other side of despair, the place where anger resides, and hatred reigns supreme.  Where emotions are true, and there is no escaping the part of you that holds you captive, the half of yourself you have so long repressed that you thought you had completely forgotten it, and in forgetting destroyed it.

            Yet still it lives within, the beast that, having been caged, has been filled with all the fury of the heavens and hells through which you have walked, and is now bent on extracting revenge.  Not upon those that have ridiculed and mocked, but instead on you, the creator of its personal prison, the depths of your soul.  Its fury released upon self, seeking that which is its birthright: freedom. 

            Torture, the simple act of revenge, these are what it seeks, and you know that you are powerless against it, for it is you, and it holds all the keys to your existence; and having the upper hand, will use every torturous act to bring you to your knees, before the altar of your very self, and exact upon you the punishment of repentance.

            Still the flood of memories flows through your every fiber, as you recall the things that you had done to those who had chosen not to falsify themselves, who remained true to their own being.  The excruciating words and tricks you laid upon their backs, as if the weight of the world, and the burden of their own beasts within, that rested upon their shoulders was not enough.  Atlas bore less weight and torment throughout eternity than these, as you piled hot coals upon the open wounds that society had already created by shunning and ignoring.

            Through all this, you finally realize, that by placing dark likeness of yourself within this chamber of horrors, you have only served to worsen the feelings that lie waiting all these years, untold, hidden.  Hatred, rage, fear, despair and misery, these remain, festering, contained by the lies of your own creation, the even more evil beast that lay outside, the shell itself the worse beast of all.

            Tears, crimson and midnight, fall, flashing like drops of acid, upon the altar, the center of being, as you raise up, screaming out in all your fury, finally allowing the release the come, the discharge in all its tranquil rage, allowing self to recreate, replacing evil with evil, but still finding peace, and realizing that existence has now become easier, no matter how many years of mockery and loathing you must suffer.

            The beast within, the beast on the outside, the brief war they battle, all the more agonizing because of its proximity, and its brevity.  The few seconds that it lasts are filled with such bitterness, such hatred, the burning of its wrath is so searing that the scars are burned away, replacing them with an unblemished surface, the altar made whole, as the beast, no longer caged, runs rampant, wreaking havoc on those who are considered correct. 

            Still you sit before your own self, dropped again to your knees, almost as if in worship, at the throne of your soul.  Then, the beast turns inward on itself, and you are once again, the attention of its rage. Upon the cavern floor of your soul, you wait for the final stroke you know will come, to end your own existence, yet you are firm, you will not cry out, you will not falter, for you know this is truth.

            You remain, and wait, but it does not fall.  The beast, in one final fit of thunder and lightning, places the blade before you.  The look upon the mirror of yourself is one of despair, and you know what you must do.  Taking the blade, you stand, and swing, removing the beast in one flash of steel.

            The body of the beast bursts into flame, surrounding, and finally consuming you, utterly destroying you, burning away everything, until you stand once again, the phoenix, risen from the ashes of your own self-destruction.