I don't know what this is.

I refuse to give up.

People tell me over and over again that it’s hopeless. My cause for the fight is pointless. My aim is only achievable in some dream. That what I am working for is an Utopian world. That there is too much distress in the world and I should end my abortive mission. That I am doing is nothing more than chasing clouds. That I might as well try to bottle the ocean. After all, who am I to question the way things are?

“It’s a cold, bitter, world out there son,” they say. “Not worth the trouble. Go home and survive. That’s what we are all doing.”

I say so be it, my friend. So be it. And with that dictum in mind, I keep moving. I refuse to give up my iconoclastic task.

Some say I am stubborn. Some find inspiration in me. And some just laugh at my maudlin nature. But they don’t bother me. I’ll be damned if I take those contumelious words to heart.

My black hood juxtaposes my motives. As I tread down the street, I am ignored. I am nobody. I ensconce myself into the corner of a busy street, hidden from the eyes of people. I hear people bruit about each other. Some waggish stories make me chuckle while some vitiate my belief in humanity. As I move further along, I see the traumatic aftereffects of poverty. I see the internecine anger in the eyes of victims. These victims of theft have been robbed off their soul. I feel sorry for them. After all, soul is the most precious thing to man. And if the soul is modulated with, what has he left?

My maladroit tactics prevent me from doing most things but I am fairly observant. I have no prescience of the future but I can read signs from the portentous history. And what is present but an in medias res of the two?

I’ll be honest though, I doubt myself. I question myself every single day. The saturnalian thoughts in my mind just might destroy me. Some say that having your own thoughts is a touchstone of the wise. But nobody talks about the curse it carries. It has no salubrious effects. In fact it’s a quid pro quo for sanity.

And yet I refuse to give up.