Ἄορνος (Aornos)
Ἄορνος* (Aornos)
(For those interested, Aornos was Alexander's final siege in his Indian campaign. It was an extremely elaborate and well fortified piece of the Hindu Kush. To me, Aornos represents the point from which Alexander began pushing for the sake of pushing. Wherein this king, whose meaning and raison d'être we conquest, became acutely aware that he could not possibly keep that which he is about to take. There's something very humanizing about that impasse, about that point where Alexander saw the limits of his prowess manifest before him. He would go as far as the Hyphasis river, where his troops would refuse to march forward and go over the Ganges.)
My conquest gives me reason
My eyes cannot stray
Heracles** couldn't take it
But nothing will stand in my way
The lines move ever backwards
There can be no retreat
I shall always be with you in spirit
Where the Acesines and Hydaspes meet!
I am come thus far
But I'll never see Macedon again
Aornos o Aornos
Won't you let me rest
Lost in a land I own
Own but do not understand
Wisemen and soothsayers around me
Asia falling apart in my hand
(I am come thus far
But I'll never see Macedon again
Aornos o Aornos
Won't you let me rest )
The gods do so hate the mortals
Whose glory shan't quietly die
Oh, what hateful things are glory and victory
The absence they leave in our lives
*Aornos was the Greek name of this fort, which literally means "birdless." Why was that the case? I haven't a clue but there are some etymological speculation online.
**There is a story where Alexander was enticed to take this fortress to compete with Heracles. Alexander's family, the Argeads, claimed to be descendants of the Theban demigod, and legend has it that Heracles himself could not take Aornos. This story is widely doubted and Arrian, who wrote The Anabasis of Alexander, also didn't believe it, but I thought it was a compelling little side-note
Diplomacy VII - Death Tourism
So here and there, in these less than fun times, I feel the need to cynically, and some might say insensitively, talk about politics on the page. Usually, most of my Diplomacy series has two markers -
It opens with “I’m not a diplomat, I just lie a lot”
It goes directly to my drawer.
But seeing as everybody is already fighting on one street or another, I thought - why not arm myself with a blunt object (my drawer) and go online?
Results inbound -
Diplomacy VII- Death Tourism
Springtime is here, the missiles are in bloom
Ran out of Kiev, nearly forgot my tomb
Tel Aviv and Tehran just started to dance
I'd bring my dancing shoes if I got the chance
Washington is never next, Putin sleeps all too well
Somewhere, somehow - Khamenei is smiling up from hell
The whole world will look like Khan Yunus
A smoke plume rises from Nablus
Maduro on an overnight flight - eye covers ready
Cuba and Haiti, earthquake rockin steady
But I bought their freedom on a Saudi buck
And the UN never really gave a fuck
If you can't beat em - join em
Never again again
We don't ever gotta stop
As long as we cut the fault and bring a mop
So for the final time -
I'm not a diplomat - I just lie a lot
I'd stop but...
I've got no reason to.
The City of the Immortals
The City of the Immortals
Stairways in and out of my mind
An apple of the blind eye
Four faces all avert their gaze
Guess it all figures in figures -
I was never meant to understand,
The cave dwellers spoke of
Where the heart runs away from the hand
Do the walls hide them or protect us?
Mirrors that we reflect
Monstrously yoked together!
It all figures in figures
Purposeless ways purposefully wrought
The cave dwellers spoke of
An eternity they forgot
They live for forever
In what eternity would consider a day
And this, this they called reason
"This city, I thought, is so horrific that its mere existence - the mere fact of it having endured, even in the middle of a secret desert - pollutes the past, and the future, and somehow compromises the stars! So long as this city endures no one in the world can ever be happy, or courageous. I do not want to describe it."
- Jorge Luis Borges, The Immortals (The Aleph and Other Short Stories)
Wargames
My teeth are bullets
Digging through my gums
My friends are memories
Left somewhere in the mud
My eyes are reticles
My solid gunpowder skin
Im a profitable abomination
One day you'll grapple with me, your sin
My fingers are bayonets
They do not caress
Come get rid of me -
Add another bullet to my chest
In me you see glory
In me you see horror
In me you see money
In me you see a rise
(...a fall)
So come throw your life away, child
Gamble on margins razor thin
You struggle and fight against your demons
But rest assured we will win