For a World With More Idiots
The dangerous habits of people who refuse to give up on humanity
A few days ago I received a message. It was not long and did not waste time with subtleties. It just said:
“You are an idiot for writing poetry while your country is at war.”
No “hello,” no “dear Viktor,” no attempt at courtesy. A sentence in a courtroom, I was judged.
Okay, an opinion. Some people simply will not like you, and everything is alright.
But in that moment I realized something curious: maybe that person was right.
Maybe I really am an idiot.
After all, what kind of fool wastes time with poetry when missiles and drones are falling on our heads? What kind of lunatic dedicates time to play with words when people are desperate for weapons?
That person obviously didn’t read any of my poems, but this long text is not to defend myself. I want to travel inside the head of my critic, who was kind enough to invest a bit of valuable time to offer me a feedback.
By his logic, poetry is useless, tenderness is pointless, hope is a disease.
And if that’s the definition of an idiot, then yes, I confess:
I am guilty.
I am an idiot.
Idiots are dangerous people, and you should worry if there’s an idiot around you, or even if you yourself are performing the gesture of an idiot without being one.
And since I have already been convicted, I need to describe to you exactly what sort of idiot I am so you can take proper care with people like me.
First of all, please take note that the most dangerous of all idiots are the poets.
They spend weeks and weeks writing verses and finding new meanings in the world. They dare to soften egos with words of love.
The softer poems, the ones that give advice and whisper about love, are the harmless kind, because at least they become books. The real danger is the overflowing poetry that crashes in and derails a life.
That’s the most idiotic of all.
Publishers, in moments of idiocy, publish them, and other idiots read them.
Poetry, my friends. Is there anything more idiotic than poetry?
So beware.
It is usually in adolescence that it begins. It grips a citizen in such a way that he spends the rest of his life being a complete idiot, without even feeling shame.
Artists. Writers. Musicians. Dancers. Actors.
Idiots, all of them.
Another trace of an idiot is that they always care too much about unimportant things like the right spelling of Ukrainian places:
Kropyvnytskyi, Khmelnytskyi, Sviatoshynskyi…
They twist themselves into knots over every single letter. They compare versions from old maps, new signs, government decrees. The correct “alphabet gymnastics” into Latin letters, the i’s, j’s, y’s, ii’s, iy’s, yi’s, yy’s, kh’s, zh’s, can you believe idiots suffer with that?
They are able to lose hours in a pair of words wondering if one sound requires two letters, when another must be ignored entirely, when two letters look the same but refuse to sound the same…
Ukrainians themselves so many times give up this level of perfectionism, but idiots, oh no.
Idiots cannot let it go.
As if Putin will retreat the moment the world finally gets “Dnipro” spelled correctly.
Because in the end, it makes no difference at all.
But for idiots, it always does.
Another distinguished attitude of an idiot is their insistence.
Idiots always insist that a free and democratic country is the only option, no matter where they live. Sometimes they wave a flag that offers no apparent benefit but brings them trouble.
They refuse to accept that borders can be erased by missiles.
Idiots believe that dignity is worth more than gas prices, and that standing with a country like Ukraine is not politics but humanity.
And Ukraine, oh, it must be said, this is a real magnet for idiots worldwide these days.
No matter if they are expressing their idiocy on Ukrainian soil or somewhere else, they keep the steady belief that Ukraine will win. Even when 800 drones fall in a single night.
Idiots wake up every morning imagining a day when the war is over and people come home. They don’t carry this hope because it is rational, but because they cannot live without it.
And it gets worse.
It’s getting too long, but I could name many other traits usually detected among idiots.
Their preference to read paper books. Their habit of collecting random seeds in the street and spending months waiting for them to sprout. Their strange belief that cats can understand what humans say if we look at them in the right way.
Well, fortunately not every idiot does these, but there are those features that every idiot in the world has, otherwise they don’t deserve the title.
I’m talking about their tolerance. Their generosity. Their preference for being with people, talking.
Their choice of contemplation over consumption.
And idiots are nevertheless still able to love.
They marry during war, they have children during war, they fall in love in bomb shelters.
They believe love can outlast destruction, that tenderness can resist brutality.
They keep writing about it, as if love itself, how absurd, were a weapon stronger than tanks.
And yes, they write poetry during war.
The worst crime of all.
I hope I have helped. Perhaps you can save an idiot from these idiocies.
Not me.
I am a complete and incurable idiot. I do not want to be cured.
I have already lost that chance to be otherwise.
So leave me with my insistence, my ideas of peace and equality, my seeds, my cats, my ridiculous verses.
Who knows if the problem of the world is not the existence of idiots, only the wrong kind of idiots?
An idea that only could come of a dream full of idiocy, of course.
Meanwhile, I will stay here with my idiotic poetry.
That is all I am fit for.
Save yourself.
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🔖 Everything I write here is free to read. Some people support with a paid subscription, and I’m grateful for that, but I’m just as grateful for every single reader. No matter how you subscribe, thank you for being here.
📖 Thank you to everyone who has already got a copy of A Breath of Poetry, which seems to have sparked all this talk about “idiocy.” To know these “idiotic” lines rest in your hands is the highest honor. If you have not yet, take it freely: it’s a gift for every beautiful “fool” who still carries Ukraine in the heart.
If you are an idiot, my ambition is to be an idiot like you 💖 … indeed, my dearest wish is for a world packed with idiots like us 💞 I believe that world will be a beautiful place 🌈🍀🎉 and I look forward to living in such a paradise
We need ‘idiots’ like you ❤️