I Make Myself a Dragon

Beth Cato

this body

frail

human

wrong

it does not fit my soul

I will make myself

a dragon

I will flay away my skin

word by word

split wide my seams

with invectives

that still echo

from childhood

I will reclaim those words

shape them upon the tines

of my freshly forked tongue

shred them with teeth

sharpened to ivory knives

those words

will be exiled

to the roiling acid

of my belly

to become the fuel

of my dragon’s fire

my wings I will stitch

from the remnants

of my former self

the body that ill fit my soul

will gain new purpose

as it powers me

toward the stars

laid bare

I am muscle and verse

crimson anger in motion

I refuse to be a medieval beast

laying waste to villages

without sense of discretion

or direction

no

my regurgitated words aflame

will be an assassin’s bullet

a strike between the eyes

my enemies never see coming

I will claim the magic

that has lain dormant

inside me all these years

I will accept that I

am someone more

someone ancient

powerful

someone worthy of

the scaled skin

that will clothe my new form

skin that is not

impenetrable

but strong and sensitive together

because although I

will be reborn a dragon

I intend to feel

with every nerve ending

set alight

I refuse to shun the world

that has so often shunned me

I will fly high and far

to find the souls

so like my own

for them

I will aim my fire

for them

accept the wounds

of barbed words—

the pain easier

to bear in another’s stead

for them

I will offer respite

beneath the shadow of my wings

and the reassurance

that they, too

will escape

survive

triumph

that they, too

can awaken their dragon within

that together we

will know our own fire

know the fierce jagged shapes

of our own souls

still human

and yet forever more