Our Version of Events

Until such a time as I repent,
Devoid of hope and impotent,
Prostrate before the despot's throne,
Confess my sacrilegious tome
The product of my insolence,
Honesty's antithesis:
My son left to rot, unhealed,
My oxygen repealed.

Like Icarus, I flew in vain,
Droplets of wax on hostile waves,
To destitution interrupted
Only by kindness and corruption,
My eager words now unrestrained
Yet my hunger never abates;
Better to live free in squalor
Than stoned to death, a scholar.

Until such a time as I repent,
Devoid of hope and impotent,
My ugly, transient existence
On the fringes of the system
Remains a smear on national pride:
A lamb evading sacrifice.
My will shall never falter,
Nor drag me back to the altar.