Ramses and Prometheus

These rulers of forgotten lands. Universes above and below. These rulers of fictitious savagery, real beasts of flesh and blood. Held out power like a high wire. Waited for mortals to fall to their sudden deaths. In the dark. In the dark ages of blinding fear. In their palms no flower ever blossomed. Roaring giants moving earth and sky alike. One hiding behind a mask, glorified. One through sheer force capturing life, locking the secret, tight. The thunder shakes the memories, shakes the ancient from deep sleep. Once more we yell to the adhering power you held. Search the flame, search the sun. Bend endlessly, reach with exuberance.

Then came the never ending tears. Washed away the memory of your existence. Which god did you say you were? The clerics became the sceptics, those that once served became rulers themselves. This is how power migrates. From one tyrant to the other. Inside we are all the same. In our unappeasable hatred we yell obscenities, words that curse your existence, doubt your divine power. Casually that which you provide is thrown back at you. Stealing from the gods made easy with an unabashed conscience. We laugh at fear and hold our own thought to a mystical standard. Every man is a god, every thought a teaching. This is when we are equal. Fuck you, Prometheus. Fuck you, Ramses. No god of ancient Greece, no god of Egypt’s sun tells us what to do.

When will we ever learn? Have you felt it too? Felt that those who speak today have no words of truth? No kindness, no wisdom to guide the wandering spirits. Those who claim that they are the likes of graceful gods of the past, kind rulers of ancient worlds are nothing more but deceiving, shrivelled souls. Liars. They are not builders of monumental ornaments nor are they keepers of warming elixirs to sooth the bruises. In these times we must brace ourselves. The lights are dimming, the heat is slowly disappearing. Dress the soul with warmness, or else it will catch its death. Not in the unending desert. Not in the mountains that reach the sun itself. Not when we have a protector from sky to earth, sea to sand!

I cannot move you. You play with fire, you play with sand. Each god to its own. Each tyrant to its own methods of tyranny. I cannot erase the memory of Ramses, of Prometheus. There you were, holding the flame. Your magnificent torso glowing in an orange hue. The wind helping you keep the fire alive. Then the wink and I see you reach down to hand us the flame. It was that easy? Then the pain to endure. In the backdrop of the setting sun, with the Nile quietly flowing there appeared the familiar coloured scenery. Homogenously light. With one hand held out hundreds fell to their deaths or found themselves elevated. You were no just ruler, no accomplice to the greatness of the human spirit. You have moved me Prometheus. You have moved me Ramses.

Had we known the end, we would not have seen sense in the beginning. We no longer know how to move blocks of rock with our bare hands. We will never set the world on fire. In this fading light we now know what we have learnt from you. To endure. To question. To create. To find adventure in discovery. To never break under the weight of responsibility. To burn always Prometheus. To build always Ramses.