No faded monster

from that time 

when our softly naked skin

was open to its

razor wire predations

can be allowed to win more

degraded triumphs

over us.

It cannot be allowed

to reprise its fetid act

again and again.

We must see its face,

and know that it

can no longer reach us

with its scabrous arms.

We have no time to let its

tired, ancient barbarism

drag us away from the

life we have built in defiance

of it, and from those who now

feed off of the love we have

paid such a dear price

to nurture and preserve.

We cannot let it drag us into its

indigo lair once again.

We are bigger than it is now,

and every day we live

in contempt of it,

laughing at it, 

despising its broken grip on us,

is a day when it can no longer

make us cry out

or freeze our legs in place.

We are needed elsewhere now;

we have no time to allow

that which no longer is

to keep us away

from that which can

still be.