Isabela - Day 5

It was a gloomy night when I died. I am yet to understand how it came to be, how it all began. The story unfolds with difficulty in my collapsing mind working to disintegrate these painful memories. I will share this story with you before it gets swallowed by the earth and falls into our mother’s core. All things return to ashes, they all dissolve in diffused thoughts of a forgotten life. And even so, Earth keeps on moving. It keeps on living. What are we compared to the vibrant life our mother bears? Hear it buzz to the silent breeze of human despair, see its concrete sky clouded by dusty dreams and drunken hopes.

No! Don’t speak so loudly. It can hear us, the earth. Hear it move, its air seems to carry hushed cries embedded in its very fabric. Close your eyes. Feel the earth’s roots crawl under your cold feet, hear its mantle boil to your anger and the soil sip your soul gradually, almost without you noticing it. It will absorb your vital energy and kill you softly, it will kiss you gently.

I still recall watching the dust fall on my glassy eyes and thorn-filled roots grow on my delicate skin. I remember the misty horrors unfolding before my clouded mind and still reminisce the eyes of the one I once loved, burying me under the weight of time. We have all come to experience this, one way or another. This profound feeling of dissociation as your monsters leave your defenseless corpse.

You are just like me.

You are not alone, I am not alone. I can hear them. No matter how hard I try to ignore them, I know that they will be watching. They torment me night and day, they whisper things I wish I had never come to hear. They slip into my brain and implant thoughts of fear and destruction. I tried everything for the voices to go away, I tried everything to encounter peace would it be for a few seconds. I tried forgetting, I tried ignoring, I tried fighting them. But how does one play against an invisible evil?

I remember walking to the sea that gloomy night and feel the soft sand bend under my feet. I remember feeling my heart beat softly in my chest and hearing my warm blood running down my veins. And while terribly conscious of my physical being, I felt detached from my mind. I could feel myself fall apart as the voices slowly materialized. They walked next to me, their eyes fixed on the horizon. I could barely hear the waves crash on the shore and the smell of the wind seemed to brush my nose without my brain processing any of the information. In a way, it seemed to me that the waves brushed all feelings away from me.

I remember walking towards the sea and feeling the salty water lick my feet. I can still feel my limbs anchor to the ground as the sand slowly rose from the earth. I recall the way the earth came to life and began sucking my corpse without encountering any resistance. I could feel each grain of sand enter my pores as my body buried itself in the shore. I remember the feeling of defeat as my chin fell on my chest and lonely tears rolled down my cheeks. I recall opening my eyes to feel my love, my hate, staring at me. I kept my gaze to the ground, too scared to look. I remember feeling her cold hand touch my cheeks as she dried my tears with care. I flinched under her touch which seemed to leave a burning trail of love and compassion as her fingers brushed my skin as waves on the shore.

This is the end, I thought, as I raised my gaze to meet her eyes.

She smiled coldly as the sand crawled along my arms which, at that point, hung pitifully from my shoulders. The sand kept rising until it embraced my thoracic cage, withholding any air from entering my lungs. I remember fighting for air as the sand slithered around my body. My eyes, open in terror, scram as my mouth filled with tick sand. I recall spitting out the heavy substance entering my body through my mouth, ears and nose. I remember raising my eyes to meet hers, only to find bloody craters where my love’s glassy eyes should have been. The last image I had of her was one of death and despair, then everything went dark.

I was trapped under a moving sand, buried by my own being. I breathed heavily as every one of my movements brought more sand into my mouth. I remember crying, my tears molding the earth of their salty water. From these golden globes rose Cleome flowers, their roots sinking in my cold skin. I cried as I felt the plants grow in my timid flesh, leaving trails of blood blending into the gory screams rising from the depths of the earth. I felt my hands open under the weight of the night as snakes slithered along my shores. I cried as I sensed my eyes roll out of their orbit and sink in these moving waters, filled with tales of life. Tears rolled out of my eyes, nourished by their own impulse, as a horde of beetles gushed from my open mouth. And while Thanatos kissed me, it appeared to me that, in a terrifying way, I had become life.

Buried underground, I screamed for air as I felt Earth suck my soul. It seemed as if all feelings of joy had disappeared from this world and I felt my memories fade as any recollection of light dissolved into these unfamiliar lands. All I could hear were terrifying voices rising from beneath the floor and carve their way into my transfigured tissues.

Cold, how cold it felt to die. This icy breeze seemed to find a way through my limbs and hide between my bones. All I could see were the last flashes of a summer night and warm laughter rising from familiar mouths whose faces had disappeared. All memories seemed to fade away, my entire world appeared to fall to ashes. Soon, I had been emptied of all essence and I couldn’t feel… anything. I recall walking into Hades kingdom while she looked at me, her dress flying in the summer night and her empty gaze directed to the sand where my eyes resurfaced, finding home in her empty cavities. The last impression I was left of her was the one of the Cleome flowers she placed behind her ears as she smiled. She left the sea without a word, simply laughing under the moonlight and she spun gloriously as I stepped into the underworld.

For she was I, for she was you.

photo credit: https://artfiles.alphacoders.com/430/430.png