Bastard, the other boys teased him,

 

till Phaethon unleashed the steeds

of Armageddon. He couldn’t hold

 

their reins. Driving the sun too close

 

to earth, the boy withered rivers,

 

torched Eucalyptus groves, until the hills

 

burst into flame, and the people’s blood

 

boiled through the skin. Ethiopia,

 

land of   burnt faces. In a boy’s rage

 

for a name, the myth of race begins.