by Raydia Osborne

Created on: September 30, 2010

I am a wretch, a man with shriveled and wrinkled skin, hunched over and shrouded in a cloak, my only possession. My blood is cold; my breath is shallow; my eyes are dry and heavy, deeply sunken into a skull that feels too heavy and probably looks too large for the rest of my feeble body. I have no strength except what is needed to shuffle from spot to spot. Not from place to place. There are no places here. Just vast darkness. It is a thick black darkness. No. Darker than black. It’s not the absorption of all colors but a color that sucks in and destroys all colors. A color that reaches out and destroys you if you stay in it too long. But you are destined to be destroyed here. There’s no way out, at least not one that we wretches can see. And so the others and I, we wander. We wander with no aim, no purpose. We do not know what is in front of us or behind us except when we run into other wretches who cannot see, or trip and stumble over those on the ground who have been long dead or hear the sudden and frightening wheezes and coughs of those near us without us knowing. It is the most frightening thing to think you are alone in the stillness and the darkness, when all is quiet and stagnant. Then suddenly you hear another behind you. And then you make a small noise, maybe a gasp, which scares the stranger. Then there are two of you, standing startled and still in the dark aware of each other but not comforted. He cannot tell you anything that can change the darkness you are in. There are no longer any words to say. You both turn and walk in opposite directions waiting to run into another wanderer.

    The truth but also the tragedy is that most of us have dismissed a longing that once consumed us, a longing that we cannot explain. We all tried long ago to express it. When we were young and new to darkness and still had strength to try to figure it out, we would find each other by just running around with our arms outstretched until we collided with each other and fell the ground. Then we would collect ourselves and beg each other for answers.

Please! Where am I? What is this place?

I don’t know…Vast darkness.

Darkness is not a place. Please! Where are-

I tell you all I know…Do you have any answer?

You mean for this longing?…No. No I do not. And you do not either I suppose.

No.

Well then. We should go our separate ways.

We’ve all tried and have decided that our own words are not enough to do the description of the longing justice. But I will try to describe it once more for you because that is the thing that has separated me from all the others. I have not let this longing rest. I acknowledge it and I still wander in search of the answer. I promised myself I wouldn’t ignore it. I promised myself that I would not be the average wretch. I look like them. I wheeze and cough and spit up blood like them. But I am not like them because I still have the smallest hope that my longing will be fulfilled. This longing. It’s a gaping hole in the middle of the chest. For some it stings. For some it burns. But for all it is a tangible weight that presses up against the heart (finish)….Most have the strength to ignore it. I do not and I am not ashamed. This longing is the only thing that makes me believe I am in some way alive. In dead and stagnant darkness, it is a small and vibrant flame though very painful. For me, the fact that I constantly long for something must mean that there is something outside of myself to be longed for. And if it’s not here in this vast darkness, it must be somewhere else. I may not ever find it. But as long as I am alive, there is a chance that I could.

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