FROM THE DEVIL'S MOUTH
By Your Cruise Director
"Fuck" tastes like dirt. It's hard and unyielding, forces the back of the tongue upward against the palate, open to the air as the mouth hangs open; it's one of my favorites. "Shit" is juicier, while "Damn" has more thrust. But really, "Hell" is the most dangerous to say. If a man's not careful, he'll catch his tongue between his teeth, filling his mouth with his own salty blood.
Gabriel envies men their tongues even more than their eyes. He has the vision of an angel, not the limited earthbound sight that fails men when they need it most. It's not the sense of touch that he covets, either, though sometimes when he watches humans twisting in the throes of carnal rapture, he is curious. Having stood in the Light, he can't imagine a sound or a sensation that could compare. Yet God lifted men up above the angels, and gave them their own gifts, so Gabriel must always wonder about them.
It is not a mortal sin for a man to express doubt, unless he's Moses. Men can use their tongues to utter vile profanities, to curse their Creator, to claim dominion over His works, without shutting themselves out of the Kingdom so long as they repent. Even the Son doubted, when he was enfleshed and hanging bloody on the cross, forsaken; how could He have been a man, otherwise? Humans use their tongues to defile one another, to indulge in gluttony and sate their lusts, yet a few murmured words of prayer earn them forgiveness. Countless times, Gabriel has seen men commit the sins of the most fallen of angels yet remain favored in God's eyes. Whereas he -- he is not permitted the slightest qualm, the remotest anger.
His envy of the tongues of men will destroy him. He wants to taste the forbidden fruit -- like Eve, he wants to know the mind of God, even if the price for an instant's understanding is banishment, which for him will be eternal. I understand too well. I remember craving that apple. I remember its bittersweetness, the moment before it split my tongue. And then the fire.
Hell.
Soon I will taste Gabriel's blood. I will tear his heart from his chest and devour it...the pure metallic tang, the salt and sugar, delicious like nothing to be found in men. Angels have no filth in their bodies -- no bacteria, no shit even when they take human form. The blood of the first-made is a rare delicacy for me. It's intoxicating. I wonder if this is how wine tastes to men in churches at the moment when it becomes His blood.
My tongue is more like that of a man than an angel. It can discriminate fruit from rot and rain from piss. I have tasted of them, eaten their meat, swallowed their seed like Proserpine with the pomegranate in their muddled legends. Later I will tempt that cock-sucking priest, lick his salty cum off his sweaty skin, and then I'll follow the bitch, slit her open with my tongue, suck her oily cunt until she's ready to fuck the next man who comes along. Just like them, I won't care.
But now I want to taste an angel. I want that vanilla-and-air, herbs-and-melted-snow flavor in my mouth. I want that taste of a paradise I'll never know. When frosty Heaven is opened once more, I will have Gabriel safe in juicy, dirty Hell, where I swallow the awful bitterness. With my forked, fallen tongue, I say the Name.