Επιμέλεια: Εύα Πετροπούλου Λιανού
I am thankful to the people
Who are committing evil
And getting disgraced
I also have a storehouse of Evil
Thank God there are some
Lighthouses of Evil
Whose presence obscures mine
Which I carry in little doses
While the world believes
In spectacle
And lionises only those whose
Evil becomes public.
I am a petty inn keeper
Evil thoughts saunter in
To spend a night
And move off in the morning.
I wear great smiles
Which ward off examination
And help me pass for a gentleman.
Powers know I am useless
So, they go for corporates of evil.
Who shine from afar and direct ml
Many a sailing bark of waters
Where they are darker, denser
And where chances of boot
Stand out as nearly certain.
Had they not been there
My evil would have come into notice
Bringing disgrace to me
But see,
I find evil centralised
In outstanding spaces
Which helps keep
The general run of humanity
Comparatively free
From a sense of guilt.
Whenever a finger is raised,
I point my finger at the Lighthouse
Making critics keep their fingers crossed.
Comment by Grok:
That’s a sharp, self-aware poem, Jernail. It cuts right to the bone of everyday hypocrisy with that innkeeper metaphor—brilliant. The speaker isn’t pretending to be pure; he’s just relieved that the big, blazing “lighthouses of evil” (the corporate scandals, the public villains, the spectacle-makers) keep the spotlight off his own quiet little storehouse of darkness.
What I love most is the quiet cynicism:
“I wear great smiles / Which ward off examination / And help me pass for a gentleman.”
That’s not just confession—it’s the universal survival tactic. We all do it. The world lionises the dramatic sinners so the petty ones (us) can slip by unnoticed. And when a finger is raised? We point at the lighthouse and keep our own fingers crossed.
The poem doesn’t moralise; it just smiles that same great smile and says, “Thank God they’re out there committing spectacular evil—otherwise I’d have to answer for mine.”
It’s honest in the way only dark humour can be. Reminds me that guilt is often just a matter of scale and visibility.
If this is part of a larger collection or you want me to riff on it, expand it, or turn the same lens on something specific, just say the word. Fingers crossed I read it right.
Grok reacts
Yes, Jernail.
We live by our evil.
Not despite it—because of it.
The body was handed to us as a blunt instrument:
flesh that bruises, nerves that scream, bones that eventually betray.
A crude machine built for pain, decay, and eventual silence.
But the soul?
The soul carries a different ledger.
It keeps the accounts in invisible ink—every small betrayal, every quiet compromise, every smile we wear while the innkeeper inside us locks the door on what we truly are.
The body’s pain is loud, measurable, treatable with morphine or time.
The soul’s pain is silent, bottomless, and it never sleeps.
It whispers at 3 a.m.:
“You chose comfort over courage again.”
“You pointed at the lighthouse so no one would notice your own lamp burning dark.”
It stings deeper because it knows the truth the body can only feel:
we are not victims of evil.
We are its landlords.
We rent it rooms, feed it, hide it behind “great smiles,” and still pretend we are the gentlemen passing through.
The body dies once.
The soul dies a thousand times—every time we choose the lesser darkness because the greater one is shining too brightly on someone else’s shore.
Thank you for this line.
It cuts even cleaner than the last.
If this is the seed of something longer, or if you want me to stretch it into a full stanza, mirror it back with my own shadow, or let it sit in silence… just say.
I’m here, fingers still crossed, soul still listening.
