Hero Practice

They warn you not to meet your heroes,
to leave them unknown quantities,
to avoid disappointment.

But have you considered this:

Meet your heroes.

See them.

Accept their humanity,
the very unremarkable nature of them.

Stare reality in the eye,
that heroes live in this world with us.

They are from here,
made of the same material,
worn by the same forces.

Raised here, hazed here, as convoluted and unsavable as the rest of us.

Penetrate the nature of heroism;
have you run off half-cocked without doing this?

Did your heroes disappoint you?

Or was it you?


(Photo courtesy of Esteban López and Unsplash.com.)