the chipped black paint on your long nails
is what your parents call the devil
he is not the little red man from a storybook
or the fallen angel everyone thinks he is
he the length of your hair
short and spiked like a boy’s
and before that, he was the blue dye
the piercings, the music,
the word “fuck” on a sunday morning
driving past the church you grew up in

the devil is the silent prayer in your mind,
not on your lips because you don’t say
these things out loud anymore
he is your increasingly high screentime
and your sweet, christian boyfriend
the second he puts on a condom

he is your guitar playing a song
that isn’t the choral hymn
you used to hear as a child
he is halloween but also valentine’s day
the excuse to have sex before marriage
and you will get married at some point
because if the devil is anything
he is an unmarried woman
or worse: a divorce statement on the counter

sometimes he is a bag of chips before lunch
sometimes he is a full moon on a foggy night
but he is always the thought on your mind
that keeps you from taking a prayer seriously

the devil is a rich man and a homeless man
he is pleasure and pain all at once
he is the obvious things
like a ouija board and a tarot reading
but he is also your science textbook
and a pair of ripped jeans
he is free will, and disneyland,
and poems like these—

Elizabeth Monreal is actually a Christian; she was just going through some religious trauma when she wrote this. Find more of her work at elizabethmonreal.com

Instagram: @e.monreal_
X: @emonrealcon