In Principio, part I


"...for heaven is as the book of God before thee set, wherein to read his wondrous works, and learn..." --Milton, Paradise Lost

In the beginning...

There's God on his throne, back before time, stroking his divine, beardless chin. Beardless because he's barely more than a boy, with lips the color of the rose he'll create for a long-necked Greek princess. One day that princess will be worshiped as a god, which is ironic, but God doesn't know about irony yet, or even time. All he knows is his own beauty, like his hair, the same tawny soft gold he'll use for a lion's underbelly, so long it almost covers his nipples. His own beauty dissatisfies him; it can't reach the itch behind his heart, an itch that seems to be spreading. He calls it loneliness, although it feels like poison ivy.

With a yawn, he creates black Chaos. If he stares hard enough, God can see shapes in the swirling darkness, moving shapes, a face maybe, that dissolves under his fingers. The air, damp and violet-tinged on its edges, feels like a kiss against his hand. God shivers. There is heat and weight between his legs, forcing him to shift, while the bordering dark edges closer. It makes his sunless skin itchy and stretched with another emotion, lurking in his gut; emotion he knows but hasn't yet named.

His body swelling, God gets a little panicky and invents clothing, wrapping himself in a long silk robe. He forgets to invent a belt so the edges slither open. As the air moves closer God spreads his thighs, and a tongue of dark nothingness slides over his nipples, which tighten into pretty little stones. Thoughtlessly, he touches one and moans. The sound bursts into the air and hangs there, round and glowing. "Star," he says, not naming the thing but the feeling in his swollen nipple as he rubs it.

The dark retreats, scared, then creeps back. It stays lower this time, breathing between God's knees, which tickles a little. God won't look down, though. Things are happening, and while he is pure good and alone in nothing, there's a strange unrightness to this, which confuses him more. He decides to invent metaphysics, but later, when he and the dark are done. Because God, although he's timeless, is getting these demands from his body for closure. This is the start of God's obsession with neat endings.

His breath hits the air in silver puffs, and they float above his head. "Clouds." They grow as the dark licks closer, up one divine thigh. It refuses to lick higher, just hovers there, and God, frustrated, must use his hand. He invents rhythm in the strokes, music as his hand goes faster. More clouds appear, and God's head goes back. It's so intense that tears form in his eyes. When one falls, there's a flutter of wings, and a small, sleepy angel flies upward, making baby yawns before settling on the soft fluff of a new cloud.

God invokes his own name as the darkness cheats and licks a little higher, starting a tradition that will endure through the ages. More clouds, more angels, more stars. One fuzzy-headed angel careens into a star, then hangs, blinking, from a gold ray. God is sweating now, and each drop that lands at his feet turns into dewy grass. While he's beyond all fear, God worries a little that his body might break or evaporate, but he can't stop his hand, not now, not when the dark is licking so high, almost inside, there, and...

"Oh, God," he calls, a thousand red-faced ibises trailing his voice. He grips the throne's edge with one hand, himself even harder with the other, and leans back, oh god yes, as God finds the closure he wants, white streams of it flowing from him. Without meaning to, he invents ecstasy. Saints and whores will thank him for it.

His work done, God rests, closing his eyes. The darkness retreats and slips in a creamy pool. While God's heart is finding its pace, a miracle happens before him. Sensing this, he opens his eyes in time to see a new form come into being. Another unplanned invention, and a bit of a kicker.

Limbs form, smooth and night-tinged. A face--the face of Chaos--solidifies, with blackberry tinges on the body: the lips, hair, nipples, nails, and the wings that burst like God's seed from the straight back. Something else, too. The ripe shiny head of...

God discovers embarrassment and looks up at the sky. Seems that silly angel, swinging on the star's pointed arms, had knocked that star right over God, and its light stings his eyes. "Lucifer," God says, blinking.

"Yes." The new being smiles. "I'm Lucifer, and I love you."

When Lucifer advances, the dark wings opening behind him, God has no choice. He is love, after all, and stands before the throne, opening his arms. The robe falls to the ground.

"Can I kiss you, oh Creator?" There's a kind of innocence to the question, mixed with a very pleasing worship.

"Of course," God says, happy that he'd invented kisses only seconds before. Lucifer takes a step, which brings their bodies close, and God can't help noticing the hardness against his thigh, or how his own flesh stiffens. "I'm not sure..."

Lucifer has very warm lips, warm as the seed God spilled on the ground. At first, they simply stand there, pressing together, Lucifer's arms around his neck, God's arms around Lucifer's waist, Creator and created. The body in God's arms undulates, like there's a breeze living inside him, live chaos, or a snake. He's solid, too, where God is solid, and when they rub, there's a splash to the west, as dolphins ride in the waves of a wide blue ocean.

Then, like the sneaky darkness of Chaos, Lucifer licks God's lower lip. The tips of their noses meet, and God sees himself in Lucifer's eyes. Somewhere behind Lucifer's shoulder, a tree grows, its limbs crooked and expansive, tipped with white flowers like pale clenched fists and fruit like Lucifer's eyes. It bothers and excites him that he's so different from Lucifer, even if they're really one. If Lucifer left, he'd be alone, except for the cherubim, and they're more decoration than company. His reflection looks scared, which must be an illusion, a trick of the new light. This makes him uneasy, and he shakes as Lucifer licks a little harder, with a mouth that tastes like...

A faint rumble in the earth, and rows of vines shoot up, heavy with grapes. A few curious angels swoop down. The uncoordinated one flies right into a cluster of leaves, and grapes spill, tickling the cherubs' chubby toes. They hop a little and land on the grapes, squealing. It becomes a game, and soon purple rivulets dance through the grass while Lucifer pushes the tip of his tongue into God's mouth. Invaded. A vine-covered stone wall builds itself around Paradise, with a single iron gate.

The gate opens.

God's eyes grow heavy as Lucifer's worshipful tongue follows the curves of his mouth, and heart-red poppies spring from the earth. Somewhere an angel sings, the lightest, softest melody in a language that no one speaks. Lucifer strokes God's hair, wrapping it around his fingers, his sliding tongue foreshadowing an uninvented act, although Lucifer never hesitates. Cautious, God takes a step back, and a tree holds him. There are apples on it, fat red ones like angel cheeks.

"I love that you can do that, the way you can make things," Lucifer says. "You made me, even. It's so powerful and beautiful, to create like that. I wish..." He kisses God again, his hands moving. Finally: "Do you want me to stop?"

"No." He is a god of little words, but as the original Author, God knows their power more than anyone.

"Good. Because I don't think I can. There's something about you."

Lucifer's lips are a little swollen, and God likes that. Lucifer is his, and it should show, so he opens his arms again, and the kisses continue a little harder now. Deeper. Then they spread like wildfire, which will be a cliche, but for now is a new and clever simile. The angels squawk and cry as the flames lick the wall and spread to the oldest grape vines in the field. Their tears douse the fire, and while the wall is scarred, the earth is rejuvenated, a richer, oilier black that breeds itself in feline form: one after the other, a dozen black panthers emerge, with no break between their birth and their forward swagger into the forest of Paradise. For each of them a kiss falls on God's mouth, his cheeks, his throat.

Only Lucifer doesn't leave God's throat after the first kiss. Maybe from watching a mother panther with her young, he sucks the skin there, holding God still. When his teeth scrape, God arches, and Lucifer puts his hand on God's hip. If God turned a little to the left, there'd be friction, but he doesn't move, only wants to. His neck begins to burn as Lucifer bites harder, but God decides to withhold the word "hickey" until the 1950s, when a cute euphemism will be better appreciated. He fails to distance himself from the pleasure, and raises his arms over his head, as though spreading himself thin will bring balance.

"Yes, that's what I want, too." Lucifer smiles, and the new moon twists silver in the sky, while a length of vine binds God's wrists together and to the tree. "It's better this way. For worship." At first, he does nothing, just looks him over from head to toe. "I want to worship you everywhere."

Jumbled, God decides to go regal, and says imperiously, "Do it." Only it sounds instead like he's begging. A murder of crows sails over a cloud, then lands with a rustle in the apple tree.

Lucifer strokes God from hip to thigh, then leans forward, his head bent. He's learned another move from the panthers, and sucks with infinite sweetness at God's breast. Under his tongue, God's nipple swells, and with the blissful look on Lucifer's face, God almost regrets inventing gender. After a vision, the fourteenth-century mystic Julian of Norwich will write of God as mother because of this nagging near-regret.

"Do you like this? You don't talk much." Lucifer looks up, still guileless. "That could be a problem later." He takes the other nipple between his teeth, pulling it.

God's silence will cause problems down the road. His Son will die because God can't just say what he feels, what he thinks. He's not trying to be cold, to punish anyone; it's just hard to get the words out. Words are unstable, suspicious things, and if God were scared of anything, words would be it. No one would invent an elephant--he glances toward the lumbering creature with its placid smile and floppy ears--if words were easily contained.

"Because I like doing it," Lucifer tells him. "I like sucking your nipples and biting them, and kissing your mouth. I want to touch and kiss you everywhere. It feels good, here." Lucifer touches himself. "I want this inside you. I want all of me inside you, where I was born." He returns to God's nipples, sucking one then the other, running his tongue around in planetary circles. Venus, Mars, Jupiter--they all hang like pearls in the sky's necklace. "You know what else I like?"

God shakes his head without speaking. Eternal habits are hard to break.

"I like the crazy things you do when you lose control. It gets me hot. Without me you'd be a little boring." It's not arrogance, not quite, more the painful candor of the newly-born.

"I'm always in control." Not a lie--just an extension of the truth, and God quivers against the tree as Lucifer suckles.

An apple falls, crushing a handful of grass, and sits there expectantly. One of the cherubim sees the fruit and picks it up, polishing the skin with his thumb. Sitting at God's feet, he takes a bite, and his wide ocean eyes go round. "Oh," the little angel says, blushing, and flutters to his feet. In a flash he becomes a man, his wings no longer white but rainbow-colored, his cock long and hard. He looks like God except for the wings and so is named Michael. He hurries off toward the gate, casting startled glances over his shoulder, and quickly masturbates in the shadow of the wall. When he's done, and his seed has sprouted a flurry of hyacinths, Michael stands guard there, a spear against his shoulder and a discreet wreath of hyacinth around his hips. With his toe he nudges the gate shut.

Meanwhile, Lucifer is still licking and sucking God's nipples. They're red now, like the apples, like Michael's cheeks, and sting at the slightest breath. God moans, a low rumble echoed by the bees as they ravish the flowers. His hips thrust helplessly, and he considers snapping the vine and pushing Lucifer's torturous mouth lower. Sometimes love must be firm, a belief of his that will be distorted in the future by everyone from crusaders to Victorian nannies. Blame Lucifer's mouth for imperialism and corporal punishment.

"Tell me what you want." Lucifer kneels, resting his cheek against God's hip. His wings are open behind him, and shimmer a crushed-emerald green. "Tell me, Creator, and I'll do it."

When a tower appears, a cloud hovers over it, then rain begins to fall, wetting the stone until it gleams. An angel finds a stalk of fennel in his hand and plunges it repeatedly into a pool of rain water, giggling, while those hungry bees suck juice from their darling flowers. Squirrels nuzzle the heads of acorns while God thinks of tunnels and trains, which he'll save for Europe after the Industrial Revolution so people can travel and see more than money down a coal mine. He is happiest speaking in signs, which will please Augustine and Freud.

This early in their relationship, Lucifer only laughs. "That's the best I'm going to get, isn't it? You and those crazy metaphors." Then he takes God in his hands and brings the swollen skin to his lips. The first kiss is delicate, reverential. The second is lewd and wet, with Lucifer's tongue snaking around the head, the tip sliding into it. "You have a great-tasting cock," he says, to see God blush. It's the beginning of Lucifer's obsession with embarrassing God, and explains Genghis Khan, Benito Mussolini and Jerry Falwell.

Hard to believe, so hard, that Lucifer will bring God anything but pleasure. God stares down at him, across the flat planes of his stomach to the thick, stiff length resting on Lucifer's extended tongue. Lucifer looks back and winks, then opens wide to swallow as much as he can, sucking and licking.

He never blinks after that, just stares with those beautiful plum eyes. "Create for me. I can't, so you have to."

"I think this might be a sin," God says.

Lucifer pulls off his cock, which shines wetly. "Then Sin is the most beautiful word in the world, after Creation." He returns to it, licking the head while stroking the shaft with one hand. With his other, Lucifer reaches down between God's pale thighs and cups his balls. "I can pretend that you're mine right now, while I hold you like this. Love lets me do it. You do. No sin there."

Can love sin? All lovers will deny it, except Abelard. And if he'd kept his balls, not lost them to Heloise's furious uncle, he would've denied it, too. God does, giving in to the alchemical mouth. Lucifer's hand is a balance, and love outweighs sin.

For now.

Then comes Paul, spouting off about better ways to burn, and Augustine, confessing that love doesn't need the body. After that, below Dante's Florence, the sexy book still in her aristocratic hands, Francesca de Rimini will burn in hell's second circle for letting a French romance get her so hot--

"Uh-oh," God says, as a pile of books appears beside him, the incriminating story of Lancelot and Guinevere right on top.

"What's this?" Still holding onto God's balls, Lucifer reaches for a dusty volume. There is an apple on the cover. He flips it open and reads.
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