The Equality of Us.

Once upon a time, there was darkness, and men walked the earth in nakedness. They shamed not, because light was yet to be known, and sight was yet to be activated. Suddenly, a bright light emerged from the darkness, and with-it sight, and also the shame of nakedness. The light sparkled from the deep and surfaced upon the face of the earth. And in that instance, the first men to encounter its brilliance began to scamper for clothing. They hid behind trees, and shrubs. They grabbed leaves and twigs in successful attempts to cover their inherited nakedness. The light, however, did not recede, it continued to spread outwards upon the planet, and more men encountered its glare. It was this light that activated the sight of men.

?Men began to comprehend space, they began to measure time, they began to want more, and some began to know the colours of nature. All this while, other men still existed on the other side of the earth where the light had not reached. These remained contented, basking in their ancestral ignorance. Yet, light continued to spread upon the face of the earth, but at a pace only nature could endure.

?So, these men began to understand this phenomenon, and they began to catch it, trap it, twist it, bend it, extinguish it, and re-ignite it. They had found that Light on its own, was able to extinguish any darkness around its plume. They got impatient with its pace of travel across the face of the earth. And soon desired to extinguish all of earth’s darkness ahead of nature’s pace.

?With the help of the light that came to them, they began to voyage across the face of the earth in search of lands and other mankind. The Light they had received freely became a tool for the exploitation of other mankind (that still walked the earth in the darkness). Armed with the marvel of light, they proclaimed themselves as gods, and trampled other menfolk to the ground. They pillaged. They asserted dominance. They ruled. And they foresaw their time would end (because nature’s pace remained unabated). Ultimately, light would reach the ends of the earth, and their advantaged era would end. They tried to build fences across the land, to prevent the light from spreading into the darkness. The darkness into which they were born had become a source of livelihood. It suddenly held a necessity they had lived without for generations. But nature prevailed, light broke through, all the darkness was extinguished. All of mankind began to see, to see what had happened, and how the ones who first glimpsed light had performed.

?By this time, there were no more streams in our land, the men of the first light had fetched all the rivers away to their country. They took all our red earth and used it to build furnaces for their shiny ornaments. We had known nothing of the tall trees, but even now there is nothing left to till. We dug our ground for them, we fell our trees for them. They raised our fathers’ heads on spikes and forced our mothers’ backs to bare the hoofs of horses. We strove for crumbs along with dogs. The veil of darkness hid this reality from our intellect.

?Whose fault, and whose fate? Who was first, and who is last? Had light alighted in our fathers’ fields. Had the cove of darkness met its doom in the eyes of our kin. Ours too would have been the men of the first light.

?I see no justification for superiority, neither is there any spot for the first, second, or third. I think all men have come from a common base and used the effort of others to claim a supposed hierarchy.?How can one man feel superior to another when everyone is one of us. Stay strong and be proud of your position. No one came first. And let no man boast with privilege. We made you.

??Lumix de luminous, 1st October 2021

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

?Disclaimer: This story is fiction and does not depict any nation, people, persons, races, living or dead. It is an allegory for depiction of the concept - ‘equality of mankind’