Best Poems Written by Tj Gano

Real Life Demogorgons

Real-Life Demogorgons

 

Life felt like Hawkins—

quiet streets hiding screaming sirens.

Mind Flayers weren’t fiction anymore;

they learned my name.

 

I was lost like Will,

vanished between breaths,

woke up shivering

in an Upside Down crib—

air thin, walls breathing fear.

 

I walked on jagged glass,

barefoot in my own thoughts.

Locked inside my skull,

my body spasmed with truths unsaid.

My mind—flayed

not by monsters,

but by my own sins.

 

Arggh!

I wanted out.

The Demogorgon loomed—

faceless, black, relentless.

Should I speak this pain aloud,

or bury my life

in a pit of silence?

 

No—

I heard footsteps of the other me,

the one who survived.

Friends became flickering lights,

stringing hope through the dark,

showing me a path I couldn’t see alone.

 

I was found—

not dead,

but drowning

in endless shadows,

Eaten by real-life Demogorgons

with familiar faces:

fear, shame, loneliness.

 

Yet here I stand—

scarred, shaking, breathing—

proof that monsters are real,

but so is salvation.

Copyright © TJ GANO | Year Posted 2026