Feel

Someone collapses to the ground. I’m trying to discern who it might be. A curious crowd begins to gather—so many people, so many different faces. The air is filled with a stench reminiscent of a massacre—the reek of corpses assaults my nostrils. My stomach churns—I feel like I’m going to vomit.

For the first time, I long to open my eyes; I sense that this is the sole moment in which I can truly behold reality. I crave a life that will blossom through my own death. I’ve always known myself to be a dreamer, and now I embrace it entirely.

Amid the corpses, there is one corpse—amid the tapestry of lived experiences, an ordinary life. I remember the past: how I was once a pure, untainted child, surrounded by others who found no pleasure in my presence.

I feel a relief in realizing that my abandonment is not confined solely to this final moment. I suspect I have led a failed life, and thus, a failed death. My body sprawled on the ground appears so utterly ineffectual that it would scarcely serve as sustenance even for vultures.

I no longer see as I once did…