Extraction of the site was going nicely. It was something of a private amusement to Devlin that the remains of a Roman temple were wedged between suburban white homes.
No doubt the residents would coo over the heap of rubble if a few heritage signs were erected, and they could boast of a relic over a thousand years’ old laying just beyond their driveways.
Devlin, feeling naughty, had decided to inspect the sealed off remains for himself, after giving his solemn word to never go past the yellow ticket line. He was pretty curious to see what the local university bigwigs kept marvelling over.
It was something of a shock then, as he made his way past the crumbling walls, to find in the centre of the site, wedged between mounds of orange dirt, a weather-beaten statue. Shocking because it didn’t at all fit what Devlin thought of classic sculptures.
Didn’t the effigies of Rome, display perfection? Apollo for example, personified the ideal male form, muscular, beautiful, and damn enviable. This figure however was hideous, pure and simple. Gaunt, and stick like, bent double or possibly hunchbacked. One side of it’s face was a cavalry of tumours and sores as its mouth hung open showing a wedge of crooked teeth. Devlin also couldn’t fail to note that it possessed a large throbbing cock, longer and thicker than its arms.
It was odd, the craftsmanship on the figurine showed considerable skill but it was as if the sculptor held no love for his subject, instead a sneering contempt radiated from the statue.
Devlin found more, as he saw the chipped and faded mosaics on the walls displaying startling scenes. The deformed creature bowing at the feet of Minerva, it’s raging hard-on impossible to ignore, and yet Minerva looked coldly upon this sickly figure as only a disgusted woman could.
Another image showed the deity bent double by a pond, weeping over its reflection, but here its reflection was that of a beautiful Adonis. The pain and longing were written on the wretch’s face, desiring the unobtainable.
“Narcissus,” shrugged Devlin “is that the name of the beast?”
A third mosaic unsettled Devlin, the Ugly God sat atop a mountain, and at his feet, there lay a pyramid of wailing flesh. Blind beggars, cripples, hunchbacks, and frankly ugly people, pleading for succour.
Devlin couldn’t help but recall the hills of dead bodies in Auschwitz, only here instead of some heartless Aryan commander, a God just as ugly, wretched, and damaged as his bemoaning worshippers, looked down upon them with a burning hatred more intense than anything simple bigotry could muster.
Underneath this mosaic, there was in black letters against a white ribbon, the phrase: “In aliis autem interficiet, quod in seipso non potest occidere.”
“And he shall slay in others, that which he cannot kill within himself.”
