Once, amid covenant of salt and lamps to burn every evening through quiet, into dark, one had the idea to cut the groves. He suggested this to others. He knew what vanities to stoke, whose appetites were violent enough to take pleasure in the raid, as though doing so would bring a final calm, an end to the torment of those despairs and passions that would strike at midday and midnight.
But what followed were empty pleasures, and now these hungers were of greater volume. From there, they built the walled cities and armies of men to protect them, and these grew notions of valor that were married to the work of weapons and attendant armors, of seizing and attendant claims, might and its supporting rights. With these, they enacted many plunders; called these Victory, claimed them Saving, recorded as the Project of Civilization.
There was much claiming in those days, of the spoils of war. Over time it became unfashionable to call out the spoils; stating the obvious was something only a dullard would do. But the claim of the owners was birthed in violence when they ran off with the sheep, and when the salt loses its flavor over time, who remembers those first trees?
