The Omen

For every tantrum made in spite,
For every lash of abuse,
For every corpse tossed carelessly away,
I am there.

I do not decide fate,
Be it life or death.
For I am not the decider,
but the omen of bad things to come.

I am here to witness the malcontent of ingrates.
To witness the barbed whip of corrupt authorities.
To witness the vice grip of fate
as its frigid hands drag the innocent into oblivion.

I do not witness these by choice.
Is it fate that decides what I witness?
Or do I have a hidden urge to seek these things for myself?
These questions bother me. I do not care to know the answer.

But there is one question,
One question I do know the answer to.
One question that doesn't bother me,
For I am far too familiar with its answer:

If I could decide, would I change the way I am?
No.
Because I am not the decider.
I am the omen.

Notes

"The Omen" is a poem that I originally wrote as a sort of explanation for the "Jellenheimer."

For those of you unfamiliar with the Jellenheimer, it's a character often featured in "fluffy abuse" comics. You know, those gore-filled comics featuring the tiny, fluffy, baby-talking ponies? The Jellenheimers were originally used as observers, lurking in the backgrounds of various scenes and never interfering or interacting with the actual story. At least, that's how they were before people started making art featuring nothing but Jellenheimers.

When I wrote this (sometime around 2020, so it was maybe 2 years ago?), I wanted to take an approach where we get to go inside the mind of a Jellenheimer. My interpretation of them is that they're somehow drawn towards situations where they witness gore-festive fluffy abuse, and simply observe without caring about the outcome. Not out of any sort of malicious intent or sadistic enjoyment, but rather because it's a sort of "duty" for them to bear witness to it all. Or, on the other hand, maybe they just don't care or even think about interfering for one reason or another. Whatever the reason is, the takeaway is that Jellenheimers are not "deciders" of fate or freedom. They're just omens.