There is a true horror in being hunted through the streets of your home
Every welcoming window become a medieval porticullis
Iron-wrought and foreboding speckled with rust from previous invasions
Every scared eye peeking through dull white blinds becomes
Jaundiced and luminous the eyes of goblins baying for your blood
Every dog’s whine or bark becomes the heat-filled sound of slavering hounds
Mouths foam-coated and filled with rabid breath

Your callused feet pound beneath you as you flee from the cackling mob
Get back here boy they call
And you think
If I was a boy would that stop you
From doing what you’re going to do
But you know that would not

After all, you watch the news
And you know the way this story ends
You can’t stand your ground
You can’t resist
You can’t do anything but pray and run

God does not listen to your cries
He sits impassive and apathetic
An old white man with an old white beard
More concerned with an unborn baby
Than a living man who needs Him

So when they corner you, their swords drawn,
You beg
I am not a monster
I won’t tell anyone
I have a family
Just let me live

Your cries fall on hollow ears
Your words are heard as incomprehensible
For never forget
In their eyes you are the dragon brought from a foreign land
Scale-covered skin lashed with scars
Heavy chains caging your wings
Fangs bone-white and flecked with their ancestors’ sins

You are the cause of their failures
You are the cause of their loneliness
You are the cause of their misery
When the monster is dead
They can truly live free

So they kill you

And you die

Their skin blisters and pulls back
Flesh falling in heavy layers
Their swords wicked and cold
Flecked with drying blood
Their clothes fray and rip
As their scales shred their way
Up to the surface

You look down and see the monsters
That had surrounded you the whole time
You always knew that they were there
Waiting for you to walk into the wrong neighborhood
Or say something with the wrong tone of voice
That would be all the reason a monster needs to kill

And now they have succeeded in their slaughter
They have supped on your soul
So they slink back into their homes
Sheathe their weapons
Shed their skin
Congratulate themselves
On a job well-done

For in their mind, who will remember you besides the other monsters?