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No no no Step away, step away froerous, my enemy But I don’t I don’t move

Why can’t you kill me, Saba? he says

I could ask you the same, I says

The first time I saw you at Hopetown, he says, I knew you Who you really are Who you can be

You don’t know me, I says

Oh, but I do, he says You have a rare fire within you The power to change things The courage to act in the service of soreater than yourself And you lower yourself to this shabby ood, he says I’ the them the way to a better future You were there at that dawn, in that bunker You witnessed my visions of the world as it was The lushness of the land, the richness of the seas Those inable wonders You do reit what I seen at that dawn

At this moment, he says, in this place, we have a real chance, ht by the earth this time We can make a better world We can know some of that wonder Don’t tellyou I saw your face Your tears You care just as deeply as I do

His words slide softly around hten Pull it what you want, I says

So do you You’ve just done it again, he says But this isn’t about what I want I’ difficult, real decisions every day Allocating what scarce resources there are to those who canmorally Responsibly

Morally, I says

Most people just survive day to day, he says I have a higher calling To serve the greater good Any violence is regrettable, but it’s a ht even say, a virtuous necessity You re the infected wounds of Mother Earth Did you hen you destroyed that cesspit Hopetown? Did you lose sleep over any scuht have burned in its flames?

I cain’t make no answer to that

No, he says We are so alike, Saba

A virtuous necessity, I says Is that what yer Stewards call it when youof infants, as you well know, he says The weak are left in the open overnight If they’re still alive in the et another chance It’s the way of the world and everyone here understands that Does a bird feed all its young equally? Of course not The healthiest and largest grow and thrive The weak fall back and perish If we have any chance of healing Mother Earth, we need the strongest and the best The greater good must always be served

His eyes persuade His voice woos His words caress We have a destiny, he says Together, Saba We’re born to command, not obey

At last, at last I look in his eyes Eyes so dark they’re alht-time mountain lake deep of his eyes, I see a tiny reflection It’s me

I ain’t yer creature, I says

I don’t want you to be I have plenty of those

He bends his head His mouth so close His warm breath kisses my lips Oh, my traitor soul What is it in me that cleaves to him? To blur me melt me lose me

I lose myself in the touch of him The taste of hies of ether An I melt to the dark, blank heat