ON THE MISCONCEPTIONS OF THE NAIVE

Of all plagues ever to have come to afflict Humanity, The Plague of The Inflated Ego has been the oldest and staunchest of afflictions. Not only has it been the land's biggest aggressor but also the slow-seeping poison in its veins since Man first learned to fuck and plough.

And it is everywhere. It is in the brief nudge behind your first betrayal, the shove behind your first moment of defiance. More often than not, it would guide your tongue in a boardroom, tense you shoulders against rebuke, whiten your knuckles with anger. It would find purchase in your heart before you know it and will hide behind veils spun from lies, pride and honor. And while it was doing all those injustices to you, you would not act, would not take a moment and reconsider the drive behind your actions.

Of course you wouldn't. For that is the way it works, The Plague. Slithers into your being, then waves you like a doll. You know it abides within, wakeful and intelligent; and beckoning, always beckoning. Why, once in a while you even get to see its face, don't you? Every time you catch it peering through your eyes into the mirror? Admiring its work?

The Bard does understand your reluctance in confession, your remorse in face of utter failure and your rage upon loss. Simple truths are not acceptable. Vain pride clouds your eyes. So, what does the man in the mirror say, The Bard wonders? What is it he tells?

How beautiful the countenance of my glory? How absolute my might?

The Bard knows The Plague, dear reader; He has stared into its face too. Indeed, The Bard would confess to have long waged War against it Himself. But come off it did, that slumber. And then there was too much beauty in The World for The Bard to immerse Himself into His Self again. They say if you catch the Pox once, you won't cross paths with it again. With The Plague, the rule proves itself true.

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THE BARD TO HIMSELF (aside):

Half of these assholes think themselves so big, they won't reach back with a hand to wipe their own shit. The rest would find it beneath themselves to even squat for a dump.

(Hah! Beneath themselves! An artist of puns, that The Bard is! Haha!)