Fire-flower, there is a sweetness in your cruelty
The abused becomes the dispossessed
The martyr becomes a sadist, I saw it though the colours
Of your ember bows, the way you’d turn, night into day
There, we are all rogues, swash-buckling heroes
Where even the victim in me can repose at the feet
Of another abused child of the world
We are not equals in the games of power
I am not a man, you are not a woman
We are only mythologies, projections, illusions
Fire-flower, I taste raspberry hiccups
When I think of you, the fruitful vulnerability
Of your moods, where like a jungle of helplessness
Is born the more severe and thwarted beauty
An artist needs to suffer to possess their genius
Like a naked child wanting to become somebody
Fire-flower, there is no pain in your adornment of betrayal
When you expect the dog to bite, the wound is cute
The nature of narcissism is entirely predictable
In the traits that define our social norms
Even the women are not truly rebels
They already fight too many battles to disobey
Their sense of pride and back-water morality
Art is not like that, it’s wild and ferocious
I am not a lesson, and you are not my teacher
You are a stranger that I know so entirely
It would shock you if you knew, my deep understanding
Of your own pain, mirrored back silently at you.
Wuji Seshat 