Writer: Kholofelo Charmaine Bashele
I lie there, face up, in the space between me and my bed, imagining daggers falling limitlessly from the sky. And in a twist of context, the sky would be a metaphor for some sort of wrath from the Higher Power. But it’s not. And even if it was, I realise how even through the immeasurable pain I’m experiencing, and a mended yet barely pieced together broken heart, that has given up, that I actually want to run. I don’t want to be “punished” by my thoughts. The daggers are everything I have to say that is formed in my already damaged yet worthy mind. Every single one of those daggers represents the brilliance that is my words. And because I’ve managed to build this force field around the soul of my mind, they have failed to incept themselves to the core that transmits them to the tips of my fingers, sending an uncontrollable ecstasy, and producing the kind of pieces an addict of such passion would.
So instead, they wish to hurt me. Although the imbalance of my matter seems neither black nor white at this point and cannot eagerly be controlled, I feel like I want to pull the strings again, but I don’t want to die. The daggers keep falling and I start running. I think I did the right thing, if I run; I can be safe, but even then, for how long? I’ll be running for the rest of my life and I say that with confidence because, it means I’m fully aware of my deep, inexpungible connection to words. Not only are they mine, but that of the world. They are my world. I stole them and ran, and now I’m alone in a foreign land, thinking they were all I needed so I stayed.
Furthermore, I made it look fair; I compared it to being my share, my rightful portion. As the rest of the world had expensive homes, and cars, and jobs, and love to show for it, this was my share. I took it, and left to do with as I saw fit, but they only tortured me. They refused to fill me with the same surety I offered them on my road to Damascus. They turned on me or did I perhaps turn on them? Them being of the world. And now they come at me as sharp, blood thirsty daggers, craving to hurt me. I grow weary of running, but then I think of how I don’t want to die. Maybe I won’t have to, maybe if I let one of the cold, stainless pieces of steel thrust its way into my flesh, the others will have no point in pursuing what has already been wounded. Maybe I’m lying to myself because of the fear, it becomes evident that I am. What becomes even more clearer, is the fact that I cannot escape this. They won’t stop falling until they have caught up with me and I have died.
I need to die so they can be reborn, it’s a way to have me return, return to the world that will resurrect my words. I prematurely took ownership of my portion and ran with them, only to have them hide from me. Although I’m beginning to think that I hid from them. Out in the wilderness, no one can force you to use them, knowing very well they are what encompasses who I am, as a result of who God is in my life. So I nonsensically kidnapped His words, only to reject them. And they wouldn’t allow themselves to be embarrassed by me any longer, they shunned me too. I was alone, but not quite without company, so I decided to stop. I lie back on the ground, and allow the daggers to have their way with me, so they do. Mercilessly they stab and twist and manoeuvre themselves into parts of me I never thought they could ever reach. The last dagger falls as I grasp my last breath, I feel no emptiness whatsoever or loneliness. The death of my fear for words has brought back life to my words. The soul of my mind is well again. I look up to the sky and from it hope and belief are displayed in colours of grey, now being infused to my core as the only way I am to ever survive. I must return what I owe to the world, and timed to His perfection, He calls, thus begins my journey back home.
Twitter: @zafster
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