Our History
Two millennia ago, a man told us to love.
500 years passed, and another told the same.
Another 500, a man’s followers killed his people in his name.
And they continue to my time.
Another 500 and the Slavs’ chains were relaxed,
In disfavour of those who’s stark beauty was demonised.
They struggle to escape even now.
Not too long after and rotten vines
Began to expand across the globe.
The rot killed history,
And yet consumed its well ripened fruits.
While the vines have since gone
The rot still grows from the same tree.
Throughout these years the blame has shifted,
From the people their idol lived among,
To his successors,
To their slaves.
Now the heads look foolish,
For their fingers point in our direction,
Yet their backbone will utilise their ears,
And continue to walk to detain us.
200 years later or so,
And a new star-spangled nation emerged,
Rising like a phoenix, burning their vine,
And they began to spread their own rot.
100 year later, and the evidence had been branded.
Poverty across the wealthiest continent,
War among the people of peace,
And those on the opposite side of the globe
still called monsters in their own home.
And yet the mere four years was called
The worst of our history, the war to end all wars.
No one was surprised 20 years later,
Yet people fantasise,
eroticise and squeal about those times.
My mouth sours at the thought,
no matter how much I try to forgive.
And ever since,
False promises, true messages,
Critical salvation, dismissed protests,
State wide boycotts, civil wars.
I sit here, writing in the peace of the moonlight,
And I have realised that I have bought into it all.
I call this our history, and yet I started with him.
I call it this despite my ancestors.
But I do not know how else to function,
For we have all done the same.
We bought into global suffering,
And so this is Our History,
And we are all the villains at some point.
The rot grows in the tooth of the beast that is life.
Copyright © Lina Al-Hakim | Year Posted 2025
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