Redemption

Essays and escapes

Essays and Escapes

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Tiny, raindrops splashed and dissolved in ripples as they escaped a tiny crevice on the roof. The autumn winds were soft as they segregated. They raced along the length of my neck and cut beneath the contour of my shoulder blade. Around and around-easing and healing ever inch of skin tensed from exhaustion.

The foamy, chunks of smoke fumed up from the mug of coffee as I gulped down the bittersweet, silken liquid.

Ravenously boundless, Peshawar’s gales evolved in a twister. The brittle sheets of fine paper clattered as they slid along the spiral backbone of a halfhearted notebook. Forcefully, I pressed the copper tip of my ball point onto the soft sheets as the corners of the papers folded over my fist. The evening skies flashed as the blackened clouds flit in auburn heavens.

Confessions. Complaints. Grievances.

The faint traces of occasional banter crawled past my cocoon, leaving me motionless; unaffected. The sunset smelled crisp and saline.

Integrating beneath my petite frame, the roaring summer gale threaded into an unruly meshwork of my russet hair; as my wiry strands dangled over my forehead-meekly blackening my vision.

As I put my passion onto paper, I casually picked up the crumpled pages drenched in words and sifted through the scribbles. With every fold, I felt my breath sinking in. A dense lump foamed within my sand cage and my tear ducts wrenched as cold tears stung at the corners of my crinkling eyes.

In those words I discovered emotions that I had never felt. In those words, I found all those people I had loved and hated. In those words, I found escape. In those words, I found myself.

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The Darkening Garden

The flower. The buds bloom into the spring’s finest beauty. The petals change color and with the stretch in time they shall slowly fade and wither away. The flower, you see is not just a symbol of life and rebirth, there are other hidden meanings as well that only reveal themselves as time unpeels its glorious mysteries. Lavender scented and glazed in honeyed sweetness, my tale uncurls as I walk with an arched back clutching a wooden cane; bent in submission. With each step, the laughter and squealing of children recklessly hopping around becomes fainter and fainter, until it’s completely gone. Until I’ve come too far-until I’m lost.

I was standing amidst a wilting field of memories. The heavy fragrance of dampness and dust lingered by as the soft breeze swirled and twirled around my aging body.

I snaked through the cooked trails and paused to take a close look at my own pot of vices and virtues: the one with nothing but weeds and thorns, the one I forgot to nurture. I bow and break into a million globules of regrets and tears every time I recall, because the burden was too heavy for such fragile shoulders. I fall onto my knees for I can’t nurse these blood-thirsty demons any longer. I fall for death is a merciless creature-I fall in fear.

 Sinking my nails deeper into the loose soil, I dig a hole. I cut open the wounds on my armor and there it was…Lying beneath a starry abyss; the rhinestone. Glowing and sparkling like a flawess diamond but composed of lies, greed and misery. It deceives; it lies to the eyes of those who sin, it lies to the eyes of those who do good but it cannot lie to the eyes of God-only if it could…

I saw my entire life flash before my eyes in its fading glimmer. In that moment, I relived the days of innocence, the days of love and the days of labor. I sensed an entire universe unveil its stories and myths within the tiny lens in my hands.