The Protagonist

Go then,

 

Slave, born unto a slave born unto a slave,

Your ageless skin scorched brown, lacerated, (oh!! the oozing sores!), 

caked in your own filth and excrement:

your matted hair, and beard sprinkled over with

Fine white sand; the skin of your hands and feet thick

with calluses, your eyes staring out of sunken sockets

Like glowing embers! Hateful!

You, who have carried your chain for miles, dragging its mark

Across the flaming desert,

Under the bullwhip of your masters. You, who are

Deeply digging away with picks and crowbars

and iron wedges

at the navel of the subterranean beast,

digging along the marble ridges in the secret internecine

Twists and folds of the pitch-black stone slope on

the steepest edge of the plateau,

Hammering out layered ribbons of gold

From the congealed darkness:

Go then!

Rise out of the dunnest smoke

that clouds the unknown heart of hell

in the white-hot deserts of Nubia,

 

And explode

 

into the feral maw of the amphitheater.

Look around you:

high up there in the packed galleries, the splendid men, and

their gorgeous women waving silken kerchiefs,

Clad in dazzling raiment, their jewels winking

in the sun, that with unblinking gaze pours forth its fire

from a cauldron of deep cerulean hues.

Hear them roar in unison! Deafening, like a monstrous ocean,

clamoring for your blood. Their eyes are tongues,

Their faces, all teeth, hungering for a bite of your

Flesh. Small wonder, for they have paid for both,

And soon both will lie there, butchered

and spread out thick on

 the hard-packed sand of the arena.

Look at her, a noble lady, reclining on 

a couch in her cavea, her head inclined

Like a Cimabue Madonna. Devouring with her eyes,

your well-oiled, sculpted body, your organ

Hanging out in full display, her lips parted,

her breath panting hard – she's already in

the paroxysms of her pleasure.

(Your own orgasm comes later when you're

On your back with your guts spilled out, in the rising smell

of your blood gushing forth 

In boiling streams from your sliced up

belly gaping up at the sky.

But of course, you knew that already!)

 

Go then, naked,

 

Out into the ring, as every mother's son, fresh

out of the womb.

You, a slave, but a slave like no other.

A man, but a man like no other, with

generations of timeless toil embedded in your bones,

and the lightning dancing in your feet,

you have mastered living where death brings blessed relief!

You, who have trained in the killer's trade,

Earning fortunes for your owners,

Who are you? What do you see?

Will you be the protagonist,

The one who sets in motion strange, impossible

Works, that once begun

will stretch forth into space and time,

towards a history yet unborn,

and grind to a halt the juggernaut

that crushes the many under its wheels,

wielded by the hands of

the powerful few? Will you be the

One who brings the 

greatest power in the world to its knees, 

Nay, destroy the world itself, if need be?

Or will you be 

Cut into little pieces, smoked, 

minced, mixed with pork 

and exotic spices and 

Stuffed into sausages?

 

But no matter! Your face, mythical, carved

In stone, betrays nothing of the  scorpions

crawling around in your brain.

Your body, (sleek as a panther waiting to spring), is at perfect rest, 

for you, the ultimate survivor, 

You know the art of saving

your strength like a 

tightly wound-up coil of steel.

 

Hark! the drums roll and the trumpets blare!

Now must commence, with flourish and fanfare

(Are you ready?)

the play of the deadly swords, diabolically curved,

(They split the skin with the slightest flick!),

The duels, the long, grisly gashes, the flowing

Blood, the dismemberment, the skill,

(Are you prepared to be the gift?)

the agony of bowels ripped out and

the ecstasy of blazing motion!

(The munera sine missione?)

Like a rush of autumn breeze 'twixt the branches

of bald graveyard cypresses,

(The gift without mercy? The fight unto death?)

A bitter-sweet aching sigh passes through the crowd,

(Are you ready, slave…)

as they wait, quivering like leaves, for

(…to set the world on fire?)

The Games to begin!