It was akin to daylight robbery, but to catch them I had to stake out the night. I peered around corners and hid myself in bushes just to catch a glimpse of this weirdly satisfying social eclipse. Clever they were, yes, but their plan was just rugged enough to stick out like a sore thumb in the middle of the field of truth at the intersection of hypocrisy and oblivion.

The beginning saw sympathy. I shed my tears for their causes. I shared their stories like a deeply connected Griot passing on the word of the people. I even went as far as to run into the middle of the battle field with a banner fluttering above my head, with the strength of progress in my hands. But these cunning victims had me right where they wanted me. Where it was all most vulnerable. Where I was too confused with social tasks to realize the real truth.

I felt like a sad puppy when I would hear these stories on the news about these "second class citizens" being treated like store bought cold cuts, wedged between the bread of greedy politicians and the private sector, with condiment slabs of institutional prejudice rubbed all over it.

But cynical as it may be, I was not so easily swayed by it all, and my suspicions have persisted, which has brought my mind to a dark place.

“Have a large number of minorities become addicted to the idea of racism?” I wrote in my diary on the way to my next mission. Crazy it would be, but crazy enough to be true. It would be socially constructed Gone With the Wind remastered. It might be the greatest addiction of all time not just for its irony, but also for its seduction. But the stronger the addiction the greater the chance of overdose.

So I went to the edge of society and sought out a great man on top of a hill. He had something to tell me that I could not enjoy for fear it would make me feel a part of the problem. He said unto me:

“Bring me the people who have sipped the water they carry to the other side. Bring me the people who eat the food they cook for their sullied shadows. And bring me the people who have the brightest lights in their own closets. For then, the people will see the beauty of bathing in their own convictions.”

The words engulfed me and destroyed me from the inside. Pictures flashed before my eyes, and each time I felt it getting closer and closer.

The curtain of course. And then, it lifted. At the very front a man-powered caravan. He walked with contempt and tire, as his feet had warn down with each step. In each hand he held a large wooden pole connected to the wooden carrier. He seemed defeated. But on his shirt there was what I could only believe was the truth.

-

They’ve done it to me. They have taken me to the edge, and they’ve left me with this burden I carry. I cannot outrun it. I cannot change it. This is me in perpetuity, and it stands as being impossible to leave it behind.

-

The spirit of myself left my body and took me closer to the scene of the crime. There was a lone door on the one side. My spirit hesitated to touch. I expected the base case. I expected whips. I expected exploitation. I expected the bruised skins and separated souls. I expected captivity and chains. I expected the expected. But when I opened it, my mind saw something different.

I saw many missing twelve. I heard rattling sounds before 18. I saw identical 1 on 1’s with sacrificial blows. I saw many burning green and many self-loathing scenes. I saw bars to the sky for more than a lie, with the over touch of craze from blame recycling fiends.

I looked back at the man. And now his expression had changed. He seemed somewhat embarrassed with a bit of red on his face. But he could not take the stare anymore. He released his unchained hands and removed them from the wooden poles. He stripped himself of the newly printed shirt and began to walk off into the distance. And that was it. He was cured.