A voice within me

Calls

Out.

Confined to speak

In the veins.

Get in a fight and

Let

Go.

But no one deserves

To be hurt.

Your morals are symptoms of

Weak-

Ness

I’m strong without having to

Use it.

Give them a reason to

Fear

You.

Why give what I haven’t

Received?

Forever you’ll be

Below

Them

It’s better than being

A monster.

At least a monster will

Act

On

The urges that pull

At their gut.

At least a monster will

Prove

That

They’re not just a waste

Of a life.

At least a monster will

Fight

For

Their name to burn in the

Minds

Of

People who tend to

Forget

Those

That just didn’t matter enough.

Like you.

Forever, I fight to

Quell

Him,

The chorus of echoes

In blood.

I fear that he’ll win the

Fight

That

Pulls at my muscles,

My skin.

So I’m pushing His voice

Deep

Down

Where I know that he’s right

In a way.

My words and my actions will

Die

Out

Unless I can make them

A mark.

Maybe being a monster’s the

Cost

Of

Being remembered

At all.

I dream of killing my

Corrupt

Side,

Until He whispers

Which one?

This is a shadow poem I wrote about two years ago - a shadow poem being a poem dedicated to the shadow of a person or a dark side. In this case, it's violent or angry urges represented as a literal voice speaking in the head of the narrator. Since inner voices can be some of the most cruel, this inner voice (shown in italics) kind of fights the narrator. The coolest characteristic that this poem came to have is the kind of rhythm created by the line breaks. I really like having an audible component to my work because it brings the reader more into it and it helps me point out important parts by breaking it. Overall I kind of always pictured this as being a piece spoken over a drum beat around a fire. But, of course, in my mind everything has a sweet drum beat.