No one has any words for what’s coming next. No one will understand. This apocalypse. This coming horror … The shift that’s happening … there hasn’t been anything like it since the sixteenth century. Since the collapse of the Roman Empire. These are utterly exceptional times. These are times without precedent. That no one understands. Especially us.
The world is destroying itself. This world … is strangling itself. Is murdering itself. Is doing away with itself, willingly.
How come it’s happening now? How did we become witnesses to this? Why us? Who said it should be us? We’re idiots … morons … We’re the least deserving … The most foolish …
No one would have chosen us. No one would have picked us. We’re the most useless apostles. We can carry no message. My God, we’re wretched. But at least we know our wretchedness. Is that why?
To be living through such times. To witness the horror unfold around us.
What steeled us? Why didn’t we succumb? Why didn’t we believe the lies – not for a moment? Why didn’t we drink the kool-aid? What instincts did we have?
We weren’t duped. For the rest of our lives, we can say that: we weren’t fooled. We didn’t destroy ourselves, like everyone else. We were exceptional, when it came to it. We were unfooled. Unsusceptible, somehow. What was it in us? Who were we, after all? Despite everything?
We made it to the coast. The coast saved us. The coast rewarded us. For being who we were. The coast draws our kind towards it. The coast knew us in advance. Called us. And we came …
The coat wanted us. The coast exerted its gravity. The coast called, and we came … Is this our reward? Will we survive here?
We were tested and we did the right thing. We, we did the right thing?
We had the instincts. We felt it in our guts. We were good for nothing other than this – but we were good for this.
How many succumbed! How many crumbled! How many repeated their lines? But we came through. We survived. We were better than the others. Us – us.
We did something with our lives. By doing nothing. By refusing. By not going along with it all. By not acceding. We didn’t compromise, did we? We knew not to.
An angel must have whispered in our ears. We listened to our still inner voice. The call of conscience.
But what are we surviving for? What new world will be revealed to us? What are we going to be shown? What have we been saved for? What will we be witness to, and why?
Wretched witnesses … witnesses because of our wretchedness. Good for nothing, as we never were any good for anything. But we passed the test. How did we do that?
They threw out their nets, but they did not catch us. They sent out their drones, but they never found us. They sought to entrance us, but we couldn’t be hypnotised.
We were survivors after all. But survivors for what? What’s our purpose? To be witness on earth. To ready our testimonies. To bear our witness …
And the coast called. This is where we came for our victory lap. This is where we came to be with others of our kind. Because there are others like us here, we know that. Other resistors. Other refuseniks.
Work in Progress 