by Z. I. Sadeq<\/p>\n
1<\/p>\n
Behold me!\u2013 Cowards and last men!<\/p>\n
It is me, the not-man.<\/p>\n
My soul is marked<\/p>\n
by malignance and misandry.<\/p>\n
Motivations within my heart<\/p>\n
lay athwart from humankind.<\/p>\n
Mutinous monster am I!<\/p>\n
2<\/p>\n
As dense as the smog that fills the air,<\/p>\n
misanthropy festers within my mind;<\/p>\n
a mind bloated like the carcass of roadkill<\/p>\n
twisted along the highway.<\/p>\n
3<\/p>\n
What a narrow definition it is<\/p>\n
that man defines himself by;<\/p>\n
to look a certain way,<\/p>\n
to act a certain way,<\/p>\n
to talk a certain way,<\/p>\n
to walk a certain way.<\/p>\n
How easy it was \u2013 how lucky I am,<\/p>\n
then, to be not-man!<\/p>\n
4<\/p>\n
Inevitably, my life became tragedy,<\/p>\n
too tragic to any longer bare.<\/p>\n
Depression covered me like a black mold<\/p>\n
blighting the face of untasted harvests.<\/p>\n
Filled to the brim with resentment,<\/p>\n
despising those responsible<\/p>\n
for my condition,<\/p>\n
for my creation\u2026<\/p>\n
I offered my body to death<\/p>\n
and communed with the void.<\/p>\n
5<\/p>\n
Thus entered Mishibijiw.<\/p>\n
He appeared like moonlight,<\/p>\n
a mountainous fog<\/p>\n
rolling up from the south<\/p>\n
slowly in silence;<\/p>\n
bright green eyes,<\/p>\n
darkest presence,<\/p>\n
coat colored the tone<\/p>\n
of the great primordial Nothingness<\/p>\n
from whence all came.<\/p>\n
6<\/p>\n
I averted my eyes in shame.<\/p>\n
My efforts were met<\/p>\n
with a low, creeping growl.<\/p>\n
I was surely dead!<\/p>\n
This demon had come for my soul.<\/p>\n
7<\/p>\n
The great panther then whispered<\/p>\n
in my ear. He did not leave me<\/p>\n
until every strand of hair<\/p>\n
on my body stood erect<\/p>\n
like sailors on a mess deck.<\/p>\n
8<\/p>\n
When he left me,<\/p>\n
so left my consciousness.<\/p>\n
His tail must have whipped my head<\/p>\n
as he slunked back into the abyss<\/p>\n
from which he materialized.<\/p>\n
9<\/p>\n
I awakened the next day<\/p>\n
recognizing my experience.<\/p>\n
This demon, Mishibijiw,<\/p>\n
left inside my heart<\/p>\n
a small speck of the great primordial Nothingness<\/p>\n
that I have carried on until now.<\/p>\n
10<\/p>\n
O Valravn,<\/p>\n
black albatross!<\/p>\n
Raptor of rapture,<\/p>\n
harbinger of death,<\/p>\n
eagle of the underworld! \u2013<\/p>\n
Had you finally come for my heart?<\/p>\n
A gloomy vestige<\/p>\n
cast upon me<\/p>\n
like a gull gliding<\/p>\n
above the shores of abysmal depths.<\/p>\n
11<\/p>\n
O Vakhos! Ancient Hellas,<\/p>\n
surrounded in the veil of the unknown;<\/p>\n
What wonders lie beneath<\/p>\n
that blanket of darkness?<\/p>\n
What is left to recover<\/p>\n
of wildness, of my shadow<\/p>\n
that once did know me long ago?<\/p>\n
Muses and faeries,<\/p>\n
gods and forests!<\/p>\n
Might your sweet nectar<\/p>\n
like a serpents venom<\/p>\n
once again course through my veins?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Z. I. Sadeq 1 Behold me!\u2013 Cowards and last men! It is me, the not-man. My soul is marked<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1450,77],"tags":[1451,1123,1447],"class_list":["post-13194","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-egophobia-65","category-english","tag-egophobia-65","tag-english","tag-z-i-sadeq"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6DakB-3qO","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13195,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13194\/revisions\/13195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/egophobia.ro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}