{"id":63788,"date":"2024-12-29T13:00:16","date_gmt":"2024-12-29T18:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/?p=63788"},"modified":"2025-02-22T09:19:31","modified_gmt":"2025-02-22T14:19:31","slug":"poem-without-a-hero","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2024\/12\/poem-without-a-hero.html","title":{"rendered":"Poem Without a Hero<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Click to enlarge.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
Drawing by Gerard Bellaart (from Pantagruel sketches based on 17th century originals), 2020. <\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Alternatively …<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DEFIANCE<\/em>

You spoke in biblical flourishes,
assailed others with a rhetoric
deadlier than the barrel of a gun.
When you pulled the trigger,
your power overwhelmed 
what lesser men most fear \u2014
the death of all and everything.<\/strong>

Such misery as yours remains
untold in diaries you kept. 
What secrets were you hiding? 
What shamed you so? What 
failure was too sere? Yet you 
sailed through heaven\u2019s gate, defiant<\/strong>
and<\/strong> untouched, without a care<\/strong>.

jh<\/em><\/strong><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
You spoke in biblical flourishes,
\nassailed others with a rhetoric
\ndeadlier than the barrel of a gun.
\nWhen you pulled the trigger,
\nyour power overwhelmed
\nwhat lesser men most fear \u2014
\nthe death of all and everything.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":44910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[18,4,23,17],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-63788","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-literature","8":"category-main","9":"category-news","10":"category-political-culture","11":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/JH-in-walking-gear-480-brdr.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-gAQ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63788"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65094,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63788\/revisions\/65094"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}