From Eden

I am darkness. It becomes me. Consumes me. The creature made me who I am and then banished me. I cannot remember the light.  It was gone before I had ever realized what it truly was. It cursed me with knowledge and left me to isolation. Nothing had changed from eternity until that day.

It happened so quickly, the light. It was blinding and for once I felt fear. What punishment had it bestowed on me now? What else could I have done to upset it? I had hidden in the darkness, thrived in it, and been comforted in it.  Why had it changed now? I could feel new things being brought to life. It was creating and slowly destroying me.  I could sense new thoughts forming in my mind with every new creation. Rivers, animals, sky. Words, I never thought or said before. It’s punishment of my world of knowledge. I knew almost all of his thoughts except for why.  

This torture went on for seven days. Every day something new and terrifying. They were perfect specimens made out of its image trying to destroy me. It was no longer one on one rather it was a new world. My fear escalated the most when I saw what he called man. It took a strange familiar form that caused a jealously that I never knew existed before. I wanted to be this man. To feel, to touch, and when I saw her…to love.

She was standing in the middle of a green meadow singing. Her crystalline blue eyes shone brighter then the sky did and her hair like the sunlight, She seemed like a mirage, the jealously I felt for the man intensified. I wanted her, no, needed her. The word finally came to mind: Love. I loved her. Love at first sight.  I watched her for hours as she sang and lay in the grass. My love for her intensified and I knew my life was changing. She was changing me. That creature from above wanted to torture me. I felt like I couldn’t complain. I had never felt alive until I had seen her.

I didn’t do anything for days just to watch her. She never saw me, never knew me. I couldn’t bear for her to despise me. I watched and I knew she loved that man.  With intense rage I knew something had to be done. He had to be demolished and her love would envelop me. Without any rhyme or reason a plan presented itself. The creature created a green paradise full with juicy red apples of knowledge and told them to never eat or touch them. This women Eve, I heard her called, wandered there daily. She was as fascinated by it, as she fascinated me. I created a new form, one I was not accustomed to. The name came like a spark, a serpent, and an ugly slithering creature of seduction. The creature knew what it was doing; it was never going to be easy.

She sat on the grass before me and the world seemed to slip away. I seduced and pleaded with her to just take a tiny bite of the forbidden fruit. I knew once she did she would finally love me and want me like she had with that man Adam.  She listened and looked as if she truly wanted to but there was hesitation. She was unsure of me and the fear of the creature that had made her. I continued and finally a slight smile reached her perfect lips and she took it. She bit quickly and ran off without another word. I slithered as fast as I could to see what she was doing and why she ran so far from me. I saw her handing the apple to him. Her eyes bright with enlightenment. She was sharing what I gave to her with him. A new rage I had never felt before echoed through my scaly skin.

A flash of light consumed the perfect Eden and the creature was angry. Angrier then when it had banished me. They were to be punished like I was. They would leave Eden forever. I felt a joy in these simple words but I saw the look of sadness on her face and the pit of anger I felt turned to sadness. I never wanted to hurt her, I just wanted her love.

I followed as long as I could. The gates of Eden were beginning to close and the creature refused to let me follow them any further. They would be mine but first they must learn on their own, it told me. I watched as she turned around and looked at me with such hate. She had learned hate because of me. Those eyes I once loved filled me with sadness and self-loathing. She was no longer everything I had once loved.  She was human and nothing more. She was the death of whatever innocence I had left. The creature made me just like it. I truly was in hell.