Imagine a young boy,walking to his first day at a new school.

His stomach is filled

with butterflies,his legs are shaking.
The boy has heard frightful rumours about the school,stories of bullies,roaming
the halls and beating and tormenting hapless young targets.
He vividly remembers the traumatising encounters he's had with such people.
He walks through the school doors with his shoulders slouched and his body braced
in anticipation of a violent attack.
The rumours of the school are true. Like all schools,it has many bullies,and these
bullies are highly attuned to the thoughts and emotions of their abundant prey.
They can sense fear,as easily as a bloodhound can pick up a scent.
They see it in the young man,the way he comported himself,a tense face,an averted
gaze,slouched shoulders,a hurried shuffle,
all of these mannerisms send precisely one message to the bullies brains;the prey
is weak,and the predator can pounce.

Before long,the boys fears are realized,he is taunted and and tormented,punched
and kicked to the bullies delight.
He understands that he could have at least tried to fight back,but he fears this
will only intensify the bullies aggression.
And besides, he doesn't want to fight,his demeanor is kind,gentle. He lacks the
necessary fire in his belly,to ball up his fist and smash another boys face.
So he takes the blows,the shoves,the taunts.
And with each humiliation,the defeat in his heart grows even deeper.
His shoulders slouch more,his face contorts in a tragic rictus of shame and
despair.

Walking home from school on day,the boy sees to his horror,that some of the
bullies are standing outside his house.
They are gathered in a circle,and from within this enclosure comes a terrifying
sound. It is a bloodcurdling scream of pain and anguish.
It could be that of a human child,but the boy,recognises the voice,and it is not
human.
Within the circle,screaming a banshee scream,is the boys cat.

A stray kitten that years before,the boy had adopted and lovingly nursed and cared
for,as faithfully as his own mother had raised him.
In that moment,two things happened simultaneously to the boys heart. First, it
broke. As truly and violently as a shattered vase.
But before the shards had a chance to scatter, from within the deepest region of
the boys beam,even deeper than his heart,erupted a fire.
And the fire encompassed his ruined heart,and like the flames of a volcano,it
fused the pieces of his heart into a stronger substance.

The fire blazed hotter,fueled by forces more potent than any combustible fluid.
From the boys lips arose a scream of his own,louder and more terrifying than the
howl of his beloved cat.
But neither pain or fear could be heard in this scream,as it was not the scream of
a frightened person,it was a scream of war.
And before the sound has barely touched the bullies ears,the boy charged.
One could only imagine the bullies surprise,when the fists of this once shy and
helpless boy crashed into their skulls.
With his teeth and claws sunk into their flesh.Although out numbered half a dozen
to one,the boy fought with a hundred times the fury and passion.
The outcome was of no real importance,but rest assured,it was the boy who was the
real victor in every sense of the word.

And from that day,he knew that to hang his head in shame or to cower from the
anger of a bully was a fate worse than dying.
He no longer walked with his shoulders slouched,or his gaze pointed downward.
He walked with the confidence and pride of a human being who had stared
unblinkingly into the abyss of his greatest fears.

In a world dominated by cruelty,we all inevitably encounter tyranny.

While our 'bullies' use violence as an appropriate response to a particular
situation,it was not the violence that mattered,but the substance behind it.
The boys heart had been transformed.From that of a victim,to a Warrior Poet.
And the transformational force was not hatred,but love. The love for a thing that
he valued more than his own safety.
It is love that inspires the opposite of both cowardice and cruelty.
The tyrant views love as a weakness,but he could not be more wrong.
It is the valorous warrior with a vulnerable heart who inspires true greatness in
his brothers and sisters.

You have reason to hate,as do all men and women,but to prevail tyranny,we must be
better than the tyrant.
Our strength lies not in our hate,but in our love. And the valor that is inspires.
The valor to be kind,and gentle,even when the rest of the world encourages
cruelty.
The valor to stand and fight when it is absolutely necessary,and not before. It is
our love for each other,our love for ourselves,a love for all the things that a
tyrant despises.
And they will witness our power,and they will tremble in fear.