There is an indefinite murmur accruing in my chest. It passably solidifies. A breeze impales molecules of air, puncturing my lungs.
I wheeze.
Fatigue penetrates my limbs, infusing into my fibrous layers of muscle. Raw chunks of brittle ice seep into the frayed rubber padding shielding my feet from the smothered surface of damp loam, saturated with precipitation of the streaming cloudburst sprouting from the heavens overcast, laden with a blend of ashen hues bleeding into the monochromatic filtered landscape. A stretch of light briefly embeds itself into the blanket of grey, cleaving the neutral sheet of sky like ripped paper, propelling its inverted limbs towards the earth’s crust.
My mouth shrivels: a flare of warmth absorbs the moisture clinging to the hoarse walls of my desiccated throat. Lashing against my pale flesh, clusters of drenched strawberry champagne strands whisk across my face. Clasping on to my swollen womb, my feet dart through the pillars of muted oak semi-illuminated chinks of dappled light. Images, pixels of profound terror, ingrain themselves into my vision: vulgar palms caressing my skin, violence imbued into its profane intent. Please don't hurt me.
A bitterness permeates my tongue. We will survive.
I throb with life and it shall prosper in a land of liberation. I shall be emancipated from the shackles constraining me to the soil beneath my feet. My voice shall learn to bloom profusely into a world of acknowledgment. We will survive. We will survive.
All melds into a disoriented blur.
Pain erupts in a graphic plume, surging across my shoulder blade. Time plummets forth, coming to an abrupt halt. Terror seeps into my being, imbuing my cells with graceless intentions.
Shifting my body mass towards left, I withdraw the stainless metallic semi automatic pistol, discharging a stream of bullets in frantic hysteria. A pitch detonates through the dense night. Hoarse, raw and brutal. A harmonious cacophony of sirens echo.
Viridian swivels into a blur. I plunge past foliage.
Thud. Thud. thud.
A draft of languid energy implodes within my muscles. My heart fluctuates in accordance with their footsteps, gradually diminishing.
We ascend across barbed coils, weaved into a 10 feet tall structure, wounds hewed into my skin. We escalate towards streaks of lavender light stitched into a blanket of apricot. We breathe, for the briefest of sweet moments, the enticing air of privilege.We are safe.
BANG.
Unfurling from my abdomen, crimson flourishes through pleated satin, dripping on the soil of the oppressed: perforated muscle. A barbaric voice evolves from the depths of my throat, dissecting the patch of silence engulfing the distant pine.
“PLEASE DON’T HURT US”
Freedom glides through my fingertips barely evading my grasp as I forsake the burden of fertility flourishing within me, witness to the withering blossoms germinating within my existence: I succumb to the snare of self interest.
My body is confined to a new impairment: the impediment of regret dwelling within my mind, consuming my newfound liberty. I am but a slave to the guilt of my indiscretions, lonesome on foreign land. Motiveless, I will wander, engraved with the footprint of tragedy.
Please don’t hurt me anymore…