Suddenly, I lose my footing. A slight incline, descending into the rear of my mind. My heart stops as my feet are planted, and the world begins to rise above me, spinning around me – I am solid, unmoving, yet drifting away from what I know. Slowly backwards, spinning, sliding gliding backwards down the slippery stone slope. Spiraling down to familiar depths from the past, chills rising from the abyss. No sound, just motion.
A shame filled familiarity swallows me as I watch my place in the world recede into the rising distance. There is a shadow at that peak. An image of me to hold a place in society, that no one may see the real person has been lost within, unseen and unheard. The shadow waves, to the world? To me, as I fade into oblivion?
I’ve been down here before, and worked hard to rise from it, but so easily have fallen into a quick descent, a nightmarish return. Slipping, easily done, impossible to stop or correct in this situation. I scream a silent scream, only mechanical movements of a mouth, no life left within, voice lost to the horror and fear fogging my realm. My scream trying to rise in my throat as I continue to fall down gullet of my soul. Swallowed by my past, always it returns to claim me.
Faster, I’m falling faster into the pit. A hollow sound echoes down the chasm, speeding past me in the darkness, the shadow is laughing. A socially witty comment, a façade of caring and interest in the world? A mocking of my plight, unseen by reality’s light? The shadow laughs again.
I know I’m near the end of my vision. I feel the icy waters licking the slope, tasting me from within – chilling to the bone and eating its way outward. Not a cleansing water, but a dark and depthless fathom where light and sound no longer exist. These waters are black and limitless. Falling into the water is certain to drown me, to dissolve what remains and leave the shadow to rule my forsaken world.
I grab at a slimy surface, the face of the slope with no features, only a cold and wet stone. Hard, uncaring, offering no salvation, only a continued descent. Empty grasps, fingers digging into the muck as it sucks me deeper.
Into the waters…God help me…I’m going into the waters.
I don’t remember how this began, and I don’t know how it may end though I have my suspicions. I am on this dismal spiraling descent losing my sight. Confidence in who I am, what I have done…what I can do…all floating on the surface of the water like an oil spill. Spreading outward, thinning, vanishing. I can see an image at the water’s surface, a simple thought, an essential thought … hope. It floats on the water as a beacon in the dark, but it is too late. I can’t reach up to it as the depths have enveloped me and are dragging me deeper.
Below the surface, the shadow a flickering emptiness in a blurry and warped circle of light, my place in the world no longer relevant and my body is losing its weight. Deeper into the water, downward, suffocating and immobilizing, I continue. No longer able to fight, no strength, no desire…curiosity and fear remain. They chase each other around my mind as all light is vanquished and life is squeezed from me by the depths and ripped by the cold. No sound, my continuing screams are drowned. Losing feeling as I shut down, somewhat numb, but still feeling the crushing pressure and deep biting cold of these depths. Darker, deeper, downward I fall further.
Alone…a personal hell, which I do not find unpleasant, merely unexplainable. A flurry of images, friends and loved ones, promises left unkept and lies left undiscovered. My life and what it was, to me and others in the world, a photograph fading as if burned by the light that no longer exists. My shadow shall enjoy his reign; there is no way to return. There is no me left to reclaim my place. There is no me left at all.
==============================================
Author's note: I realize this is something of a journey, contradictory to my original intent of presenting merely an image, but that's how this fleshed out when I actually set down to write about my vision of this descending slope. I encourage critical review of this and and suggestions you may offer. Thank you for reading.
A shame filled familiarity swallows me as I watch my place in the world recede into the rising distance. There is a shadow at that peak. An image of me to hold a place in society, that no one may see the real person has been lost within, unseen and unheard. The shadow waves, to the world? To me, as I fade into oblivion?
I’ve been down here before, and worked hard to rise from it, but so easily have fallen into a quick descent, a nightmarish return. Slipping, easily done, impossible to stop or correct in this situation. I scream a silent scream, only mechanical movements of a mouth, no life left within, voice lost to the horror and fear fogging my realm. My scream trying to rise in my throat as I continue to fall down gullet of my soul. Swallowed by my past, always it returns to claim me.
Faster, I’m falling faster into the pit. A hollow sound echoes down the chasm, speeding past me in the darkness, the shadow is laughing. A socially witty comment, a façade of caring and interest in the world? A mocking of my plight, unseen by reality’s light? The shadow laughs again.
I know I’m near the end of my vision. I feel the icy waters licking the slope, tasting me from within – chilling to the bone and eating its way outward. Not a cleansing water, but a dark and depthless fathom where light and sound no longer exist. These waters are black and limitless. Falling into the water is certain to drown me, to dissolve what remains and leave the shadow to rule my forsaken world.
I grab at a slimy surface, the face of the slope with no features, only a cold and wet stone. Hard, uncaring, offering no salvation, only a continued descent. Empty grasps, fingers digging into the muck as it sucks me deeper.
Into the waters…God help me…I’m going into the waters.
I don’t remember how this began, and I don’t know how it may end though I have my suspicions. I am on this dismal spiraling descent losing my sight. Confidence in who I am, what I have done…what I can do…all floating on the surface of the water like an oil spill. Spreading outward, thinning, vanishing. I can see an image at the water’s surface, a simple thought, an essential thought … hope. It floats on the water as a beacon in the dark, but it is too late. I can’t reach up to it as the depths have enveloped me and are dragging me deeper.
Below the surface, the shadow a flickering emptiness in a blurry and warped circle of light, my place in the world no longer relevant and my body is losing its weight. Deeper into the water, downward, suffocating and immobilizing, I continue. No longer able to fight, no strength, no desire…curiosity and fear remain. They chase each other around my mind as all light is vanquished and life is squeezed from me by the depths and ripped by the cold. No sound, my continuing screams are drowned. Losing feeling as I shut down, somewhat numb, but still feeling the crushing pressure and deep biting cold of these depths. Darker, deeper, downward I fall further.
Alone…a personal hell, which I do not find unpleasant, merely unexplainable. A flurry of images, friends and loved ones, promises left unkept and lies left undiscovered. My life and what it was, to me and others in the world, a photograph fading as if burned by the light that no longer exists. My shadow shall enjoy his reign; there is no way to return. There is no me left to reclaim my place. There is no me left at all.
==============================================
Author's note: I realize this is something of a journey, contradictory to my original intent of presenting merely an image, but that's how this fleshed out when I actually set down to write about my vision of this descending slope. I encourage critical review of this and and suggestions you may offer. Thank you for reading.
