you know nothing of me you will never know me look all you want search all you want you will never know you do not want to ever know the rage i hide behind this thick skin the instinct to protect what’s mine after all that has been taken from me i will protect this i will mutilate myself i will scar myself until the outside matches the inside to keep them safe from the devil within me from the infection i was and am and always will be from the sickness that cracks the world in me into rust and bleeding and puss and garden shears struck through pried palms and tongues frozen on barbed wire fences and tires burning thick black plumes into nostrils cleaved open you do not know the lengths i have gone through over nothing what i’ve done to anyone when nothing even mattered but here and now with all that i have left i will gouge you all i will render you all i will bare my teeth and i will howl and i will show you the sort of animal i truly am when cornered and nothing that ever threatened my own in this world will be safe from harm