Page 67 - The Bridge Vol 17_pgs

VOLume 17

I implore us to ignore their hollow incitements
to tempt us into battle with our siblings in bonds
whom despots have disguised as adversaries
seeded to divide and distract us to such a degree
that the very chariots and trebuchets
with which we perform in shackles
will never find targets in their aging institutions
built to profit on the plight of the imprisoned
but will instead complete the systemic purge
that our overseers have too long sanctioned
to condemn us without trial to public executions
readily delivered by our own bloodied hands
in the hopes that we will yet come to forget
that those who share our struggles are not our foes
but should rather be our greatest friends—
may we now make their marble thrones quake
with the thunderous rapture of rattling chains
as we march in ranks of unfettered fury
to topple the monuments to our oppression
and chorus ourselves with the chant of one mantra
voiced by thousands of frothing mouths
echoing our fallen forebears’ fearless cries:
ego Spartacus,
Spartacus sumus.

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