His Feet Are Mine

Morality is a fickle beast. People like to act like it’s simple, like there’s a clear line between right and wrong, like we all just know which side we’re on. But that's a lie. No one really knows. Not deep down.

I wrote this on a whim one day, just to see if I could step into the mind of someone who understands it better than anyone.

~

If you have ever felt the satisfaction of watching someone you loathe burn at the stake, then you have felt the guilt of your hate alongside it. For all things come at a price parallel to your pleasure.

That is why a sword is double edged and a coin has two sides. That is why the world is so obsessed with what’s good and what’s bad when everyone knows deep down… there’s no such thing.

I have felt the fiery pits of hell, as I have also drank from the rich falls of heaven. I have glided through the clouds, basking in the light of the gods and have fallen further than the core of the earth.

I’ve watched the grass grow from the soil and watched the weeds usurp the earth. I have tasted the bitterness of hate and have sunk in the forbidden pleasure of love so pure and so desperately wrong that I have not known good from bad and right from wrong and love from hate.

I only know that my father would not be proud of me. But he would know what it was like to walk my footsteps, for his feet are mine and so are his eyes.

~

Here’s the thing about morality: we like to pretend it’s absolute. We like to believe that good is good and bad is bad, and that the line between them is as clear as the edge of a knife.

But deep down, we know that’s not true.

That’s what I was exploring when I wrote this passage. I wanted to dig into the weight of morality, of choices that can’t be neatly categorised. I wanted to write about guilt and desire and the way the world never lets us have one without the other. And I wanted to do it in a way that felt as inevitable as breathing.

Let’s start with the first line:

“If you have ever felt the satisfaction of watching someone you loathe burn at the stake, then you have felt the guilt of your hate alongside it.”

There’s no easing into this. No preamble. Just a statement. Stark and confrontational. And the reader is forced to sit with it. I was deliberate about this choice. I didn’t want to just say, 'Hate comes with consequences.' That’s passive. That’s forgettable. Instead, I wanted the reader to feel that moment—to feel the heat of the flames, the satisfaction, and then the guilt that comes creeping in like smoke.

This passage plays a lot with duality. A sword is double-edged. A coin has two sides. These are simple, familiar images, but I didn’t use them just for the sake of metaphor. I used them because they illustrate something that is uncomfortably true: no action exists in isolation. Every choice, every moment of pleasure, every so-called victory has a cost. And deep down, we all know it.

Then there’s the shift—the part of the passage where I let the narrator slip into something almost mythic:

“I have felt the fiery pits of hell, as I have also drank from the rich falls of heaven. I have glided through the clouds, basking in the light of the gods, and have fallen further than the core of the earth.”

I could have kept this grounded, made it more literal. But that wouldn’t have worked. This isn’t about specific events; it’s about extremes. It’s about the highest highs and the lowest lows. It’s about being human and knowing that to truly feel something—to truly live—is to experience both.

And then there’s the line that pulls it all together:

“I only know that my father would not be proud of me. But he would know what it was like to walk my footsteps, for his feet are mine and so are his eyes.”

This is where the personal weight comes in. This is where the passage stops being about abstract morality and starts being about something real. Identity. Inheritance. The way we live in the shadows of those who came before us, whether we like it or not.

I took a risk in leaving this line ambiguous. I don’t explain what the father would disapprove of. I don’t spell out what the narrator has done. And I don’t have to—because the real point isn’t what happened. The real point is that the father, despite his judgment, has walked the same path. That no matter how much we try to separate ourselves from the people who raised us, we still carry them with us. In our choices. In our fears. In our guilt.

So, what did I learn from writing this? That sometimes, you have to let a passage sit in its own weight. That sometimes, ambiguity is more powerful than clarity. That sometimes, morality isn’t a matter of good and evil—it’s a matter of how much you’re willing to pay for the choices you make.

And that, more often than not, the people we fear disappointing the most are the ones who understand our failures better than anyone.