Hazard Classification: Voice

Ladies, gentlemen, hide your children.

This announcement has been a long time in the making and a long time coming.

It's something I've considered so many times and attempted to address over the years.

Damage may include disruption, unrest, or influence.

Do not engage with this individual.

—

I am cursed, my friends and my rivals too.

I am cursed.

Not because I once treated a traveller with contempt or because I stood in a fairy ring.

I am cursed far worse.

—

With an insatiable desire to be the best.

With an insatiable self-belief that I am

The best.

—

In my head I'm not even on the same level as many of you.

In my head I'm one of the greats, destined to be held up as an example

Of greatness.

—

It may be trite for me to say but this mantle is not an easy one to hold aloft.

It may seem glib but reasoning of my own inception dictates

I'm right

You may see my literary antics as literal shenanigans and tomfoolery.

—

Sometimes greatness is only understood

After the fact.

—

Like the devastation left behind after a storm.

You see the potential but only after, so you see

The carnage.

—

Carnage and disruption are my aims.

Literary immortality walking the fine line between infamy and fame.

There is artistry in every line.

Gin soaked or whisky doused.

Driven by a lack of sleep

and gnawing worthlessness.

—

I drown the naysayer in my head

with bravado and stale sweat.

I can't dance, can't sing

and there's definitely something

about the way I walk.

But I can weave words into something better

than the tapestry vile I was stitched into

By circumstance

And consequence

And classist dissonance.

—

A storyteller with a taste for

unmasking the monster in the theme park. Weaponising the fear

we all have inside us

and shining your own

dirty putrid reflections

back at you.

—

We're all Dorian Grey.

—

No one escapes and no one takes the high ground.

We're all Dorian Grey.

The vipers circle one and all.

—

I know my place, understand my role

As a protozoa in a large shark-infested lagoon.

Feeding on the bacteria

and poisoning the waters

with dysentery and malaria.

—

But my synapses are attuned to sharpness.

I have more than just amoebae, flagella (whip-like tails), or cilia (hair-like structures).

—

I have a voice

and if that doesn't cause

a tremble or leave you reeling and keeling

Bring down the portcullis

or ring the alarm bells.

I don't know what will.

—

Perhaps it's another case

of hubris-soaked discharge

leading to premature intoxication.

—

Forewarned is forearmed

said the man

with the peashooter

facing down the drone

with missiles locked on.

*

Thanks for reading