The Anguish of a Man Stuck in Nowhere

Over the hundred pounds shackled to my soul, the earth-shaking flutter of these monumental creatures that fly above my head and my own decaying flesh. I am conscious. I exist.

I can no longer recall the last time I’ve gazed at the sun, despite having a wide view of the sky. I see the smoke of fires and the shadows of gigantic creatures, bewildering deities with their bodies the size of castles, and their wings as long as ancient trees.

My knees have not moved in a long time. It may have been years since my last try at standing upright. I watch the arthropods climb me as if I were an enormous rock ever since. They explore what’s left of my hair, search for food on my face and leave.

My body has been in a state of festering undeath for as long as I can remember. I no longer feel the agony when the flies walk on my eyes, nor when the maggots eat through my flesh until they disappear inside.

Here, there is no notion of time. There is no sleep or diversion. There is no day or night. There is no protection or bond to anything. Here, life happens despite yours. And it was never different. Everything runs its course in a perpetual agony of surviving, and I am but a spectator of this grim spectacle. Here, the only present consciousness is yours, and here, you are completely aware of every second you are awake. Each moment, each thought, each intention and desire is deeply engraved in your conscience. Clear and sober, as your first day.

I remember the beginning of my torment. Desperation, fear, regret. I would latch onto signs I interpreted as a salvation. Such as the first time I witnessed one of the flying creatures descending from the heavens. I wailed fervent tears and howled as those who wish to live at any cost.

As it landed, it stared at me with eyes as big as a tall man, opened its mouth and pressed my body with its huge beaks. I recall my stomach exploding like a cockroach, caught between a floor and a boot. And I woke up again in the same inhospitable, red landscape, rotting and somewhere else with my memories intact.

I wandered for an eternity, as something kept my hunger and thirst satiated. I’ve died uncountable times, only to wake and wander to death one more time.

There was no other person to see. It was only me and everything I could never comprehend. A great echo filled with unsolvable mysteries. A creative void of an eight year old child or a religious fanatic. This world exists, and it doesn’t. Given that it is real to me, but not to you. There are other worlds like this, orbiting their own system inside and outside of us. You could be living in one, or one could be living in you.

This is a world that destroys you completely. You try to end yourself, in hope of freedom. You can’t, because nothing here dies or lives, everything simply is. You dissociate in despair and try it in other ways. Clobber your own head, drown, set fire to yourself and nothing works. No external influence is capable of easing the burden of suffering.

You mold into it. Become mute. When you suddenly come back to your senses and understand that you were one with the pain. You could only hear the wind through the dry bushes and the grains of sand dislocating beneath your feet. Eventually — you realize that there is no purpose in walking. If you are imprisoned in nowhere, then there is no place better than wherever you are. — And your will is broken.

Thus, here I am — because I still suffer. Decades or centuries in agony — and only indifference is not enough, because here nothing exists but pain and decay. I remain here because I still am, and when I am not anymore, I will still be here — as a memory of what I once was.