do you remember when we were like lions?

poetry // fiction // prose

[withaword]

hitler killed six million jews in six years; stalin killed twenty million in the Great Teror; mao killed forty-five million in four years.

history tells the story of how we continuously forget that our villains are human too.

[withaword]

it's the end of the world as we know it, the radio croons and i turn it off.

it's nothing anyone needs to hear, again, repeated.

it's nothing that we don't already know.

(a century since it began and we still haven't discovered how to stop it from ending.)

[withaword]

hoooooooly.

it's been a while since i've posted anything here. unfortunately, school and life and just. things caught up and crushed me.

but i'm planning a few things so expect some new poems and such in the coming weeks!

thank you for those who continued to follow me through the horrendous dry spell.

[withaword]

where were we going before this?

i can hardly remember now, dear, what life was like before this collision course.

which way is right or wrong?

which road leads to hope, happiness?

where do i have to turn to reach the end in one piece?

[withaword]

your pretty words are meant to light me on fire.

this soft smile you give is supposed to spin my head around, trick me into the illusion of grandeur and opulence

but it isn't working, dear, not this time. never again.

[withaword]

we are winning at a losing game, don't you know, darling?

we are not supposed to win this, dear, we are not supposed to walk out with heads high and grins bold.

but what they don't know will hurt them, will destroy them, and we have too many battles under our belts to lose the war.

[withaword]

somehow this is the part they always forget. after the day, after the war, after the sun has set on the bleak survivors, after the walls settle in clumps of concrete and ashes and the pyres fade into darkness, there is only silence and grief.

[withaword]

we're cruel things, baby,

we are all destroying the things we ought to be protecting.

we are all fighting for things that we can only dream of touching, glory, hatred, love, honour.

we are burning down everything in the hopes that the sun will show a world that we can call our own.

we're all cruel things here, baby, and we are all starving and desperate.

[withaword]

it is like a contagious disease.

you start a war and then you can't stop starting them; you punch and kick at me, pull my supports out from beneath my feet, burn my villages to the ground just to make a point just to show the world that you can.

there is no cure to this disease or, if there is one, it will end in our mutual destruction.

[withaword]

you want me to be your hero

and all i want is a happy ending with you.

god knows i can't do both.

[withaword]

you ask me how i can be certain that the world is conspiring against us,

that this loves and theses kisses were meant for people more holy than us.

and i tell you, i don't know, dear, but i know that we were always heading for disaster.

[withaword]

what do you say to someone who once had it all?

how do they describe the overwhelming loss as they move from everything

lust land power glory fame

to nothing?

[withaword]

enemy of mine, how i loathe you! how i despise you!

but this hatred is solely mine, this perverse power of intimate destruction is mine alone.

the enemy of of my enemy is not my friend. they are my foe.

[withaword]

time is a circle

(everything was always going to come back to this moment, this beach)

history is a river

so is it any wonder that i am here, now, again, fighting for our freedom?

[withaword]

they look at me like i am the devil incarnate and perhaps i am.

i have come here to destroy, after all.

glory is on the tip of my tongue and it is written in a language older than time, older than the windswept sand

let this be my holy crusade.

[withaword]

mine is not a simple legacy:

on one side there is war and history of a land that will always be my home

on the other is a country that is still bright with anguish, bright with flames as we burn higher, grow hotter than ever before.

1066, 1492, 1917, 1970 and 1982 are all dates, numbers, that are branded into the skin of my ancestry;

there is no escape from the

past.

[withaword]

some days i want to burn everyone i touch or cut my tongue on words as sharp as glass, and let the blood maim.

i want to bring pain and darkness, i want to hurt and destroy because i can

because that power is there, hidden by a sheer curtain of shame.