Photo by Eric Ward on Unsplash
If the final girl were a final boy
would he know how to dart into corners
dissolve under beds
disappear behind walls
to escape
a predator’s eye?
If the final girl were a final boy
would he know how evil
could slink from his body
turn around and attack him
a greedy, grasping newborn
that had slid soft as silk
from between his thighs?
Would he know how his teachers,
his friends and his lovers,
became a coven of witches
casting spells on broken glass
weaving promises and lies?
Would he know how his mother
had suffered
the same fate he is fighting now
how her silhouette was made to be
captured by the camera lens
how the blood spilled
how death wasn’t a scream
but a sigh?
Would he know he was living in the universe
where no one plays fair
where the prom queens
and cheerleaders die?
Would he know how to grip the knife
with shaking hands
how to see through the blood in his eyes
how to grit his teeth
and never reveal himself
with a single
cry?
Would he know the things
women know—
—if the final girl were a final boy,
would he
survive?
Stephanie Parent is a graduate of the Master of Professional Writing program at USC, and her poetry has been published in Goblin Fruit and is forthcoming in Corvid Queen. She lives and writes in Los Angeles.