~ Hýbris Hērōïsmou ~~ Hubris of Heroism ~~ Ὕβρις Ἡρωϊσμοῦ ~

~ Hýbris Hērōïsmou ~ ~ Hubris of Heroism ~ ~ Ὕβρις Ἡρωϊσμοῦ ~

you begin

to notice you are not

alone in the maze

they keep arriving

not wandering/wondering not exploring

entering with purpose

they carry weapons

weapons of certainty

stories about what must be destroyed

you recognize them

they are not strangers

they are the heroes fabled to have conquered the maze the same champions also fabled to have never returned

their stories sound different and yet the same

they speak of ways to survive ways you once learned to survive

these are the voices you trusted to do what you could not

you sent them

each one arrived convinced they knew what the darkness meant

each believed naming the enemy was the same as understanding it

they do not see the maze

they see their own design

they do not listen they impose

they call darkness the enemy and answer it by imprisoning it in even more darkness magnifying the illusion of its omnipotence

they seal passages they shatter surfaces

they demand straight lines where only curvature endures

they blame you for the intricacy of your own lostness

they accuse you of being the monster of your/their madness as though heroism were a sentence they could never escape

they call this protection

the maze tightens

too many voices claim to know the way out

each hero tries to make you fit their reflection

each insists safety and victory look like them

and in doing so they become distorted shaped by

the very darkness they refuse to face

you see now madness does not come from the presence in the maze

it comes from being torn between competing certainties from tyrannical securities masquerading as salvation

from being remade by those who never stayed

long enough to know you

from heroes

twisting

your maze into the very monster it was never meant to contain

falsus in uno falsus in omnibus

they came to destroy a monster

they depart having left behind greater ones

believing what they fear will save you from

what they refuse to face themselves

you are left with the question

do they seek salvation

for you or from you