You’re walking down the street. It’s a warm, sunny day. It’s quiet. There aren’t many people around so you’re relaxed and everything feels bright, breezy, carefree. You’re searching for somewhere good to eat lunch, so you keep walking, looking around.

You inhale a long, deep breath, smiling at a group of people walking by. They smile back. You feel happy and content with the world.

Then a man jumps out of an alley in front of you, lifts up a rifle and blows your legs off.

Blood sprays everywhere, you collapse onto the concrete, screaming. The pain is searing, overwhelming, mind-blowing. It’s like a million poker-hot, sharp needles stabbing your legs. You turn to see your own blood trickling across the concrete, dribbling into a drain.

The happiness you’d felt a second before is gone. Down the drain, like your blood.

And, as you scream for help, the man with the gun walks over. He bends over you and – with a pair of pliers – starts pulling your teeth out. One by one by one. It’s inexplicable; you can’t understand why. Each crunching, scraping yank of the pliers adds thundering, burning turmoil to your world.

Why is this man picking on you? What have you done to him? Why does he want all your teeth?

But there are no answers from him. He’s indifferent, emotionless, carefree. Like you were a moment ago. He just keeps pulling, pulling, pulling out your teeth. Until he has every last one. Until a fountain of your blood streams down your neck and your gums are a hot mush.

Then, when he’s done, he walks away. Leaving you.

He’s left you here with no legs, no teeth and your life-blood seeping away into a rusted, dirty drain. As if it means nothing; as if you mean nothing.

Your heart is pumping so hard you feel it in your throat as ice-cold panic clamps down on your chest. And, as you lie there, the copper taste of blood in your mouth, you now know what it feels like for an elephant that has faced an ivory poacher.

Stop the killing of majestic elephants by adopting one today.