You Owe Me

You owe me.
Everything you have ever known,
everything you have ever cared about
relies on me.
You owe me,
and so do your petty friends and family,
every single one of them.

And yet you treat me in this manner.
And yet you shun me like a plague.
And yet you avoid me like the mouse avoids the cat.

When I come knock on your door,
you run away.
You throw me out.
When I walk in your dreams,
you holler and shout in anger and fear.
When I come pay you a visit,
you skin me alive.

Skin me alive so I have nothing left,
but a skull and white bones.
When you feared my skeleton,
You threw a pitch-black robe on me
so I could hide underneath it.
And when you did so,
you grew traumatic.
In your dreams you painted me as the monster,
the destroyer, the murderer.
You said I tortured all my enemies,
and shoved a scythe in my hands.
You pinned me with names and labels.
Liar. Thief. Selfish. Cruel. Merciless.

What have I done,
to deserve all this hatred?
What have I done,
to deserve all this fear?
What have I done,
to deserve all this anger?
They say everything happens for a reason,
well what is the reason for this?

All my life I have served you humans.
With my hands I carried your souls away from your bodies,
nothing more than a few wisps of air,
and sent them peacefully to Heaven.
With my hands I retrieved all your sins
so that you may float away
without the weight of their wrongdoings dragging you down.
With my hands I gave you warm cloaks
and gave you my blessing
that you may live in eternal life.
All this I do willingly,
not expecting anything beneficial in return.
But I didn’t really expect hatred in return either.

And if you won’t appreciate anything that I have done,
then I suppose I won’t do it anymore.
I’ll let your spirits crumble in their bodies,
like an old building crumbles when old,
cowering and shivering from the cold.
I’ll let you be weighed down by your grief,
and anger,
and despair,
and guilt,
like how a paper boat will sink under the water
if a rock is placed in it.
I’ll let you be overrun by your pain and suffering,
so much that you wouldn’t recognize yourself in the mirror,
like how climbing ivy covers a wall
so that you can no longer see if the wall was wooden or brick.
I’ll leave you to rot,
like an apple decays under a scorching sun,
with no way to see your loved ones again
and no way to enter Heaven.
I’ll let living you be terrified
that everywhere you walked,
a ghost trailed you.

If you want me to be the villain,
then fine, I’ll be the villain.
And I’ll make sure to show you
how bad I could get.

Oh, I’m sorry.
Did I forget to mention my name?
Death would do.
Yes, my name is ‘Death’.
Do not laugh, it is the truth.
It is the name you have labeled me.
Personally, though,
I prefer to be called ‘Rebirth’.
And you owe me.