like a rabid dog, stinking of neglect and the absence of a loving home its bones protrude through thin layers of skin and fur it’s cultivated by its madness how did it become like this? how did it deteriorate so horrifically into such an unrecognizable thing? a curse? it thinks sometimes that it has been cursed, either by others or perhaps, more frighteningly, it’s own mind. choice? no. it can’t be that simple. surely nobody would choose this. a twisted combination of the two? it ponders as it prowls, on the hunt for a resource it won’t allow itself. just passing the time really. children stare and point at the state of the animal’s ragged form, whispering about cause and effect. a pitiful thing, like a rabid dog frightened by the bass of its own growl it scares itself does it scare you?