Surat thing - First draft.
Do not breathe until absolutely necessary.
Cold metal hands gripping at his breath now. Clawing open his windpipe.
He holds onto his last lungful of air as desperately as he holds his two-year-old atop his shoulders. Exhale.
Give up. Inhale.
His mouth opens in one last silent prayer and the filth floods in. Innocent eyes watch as he joins the floating pool of dead bodies.
Then the water rises and drains the life from those eyes.
You have nothing. You work. Build, define, design, sweat, toil, have a small sense of satisfaction. Relief even. Move beyond mediocrity or at least towards it. Eventually, you have a home. Your home. You have a family. Your family. Devastated, destroyed, ravaged. Gone.
At 6 pm it was ankle-deep.
At 9 pm people were drowning asphyxiating suffering breaking down dying.
At midnight the city was drenched in chaos.
Then there was a sickening stillness.
Screams for help silenced. The agony of watching your life deconstruct ended.
All that ever was alive there was now a dissolving wreckage of bodies.
A vegetable vendor lying limp encircled by decaying tomatoes drifting away.
Women floating entwined in tangles of pretty flowing dark hair. Beauty at its worst.
Eyes once gleaming with purity now empty and glazed over.
Signs bent and light bulbs smashed and stray dogs afloat.
Quarrels unresolved and genius untapped and words unspoken strangled.
Compensation – 100 Rupees each. 200 if you’re lucky enough to have lost it all - your home, your family, your means of livelihood. Probably nothing though. Not for a very long time. Go back to the empty space that was your life. Inhale what used to be your fresh air. Breathe in the viruses.
Wade through the mud. Breathe in the stench. Stumble through the debris. Through the broken bits of what you lived in and worked for. Wade through the rotting bodies. Find your own. Find what was once yours. Or what you had hoped would be yours. Yes, the hunt for bodies is on. Hold in your arms the death of your love. Cry. The rain streaks down your face so it doesn’t matter. Pick up the pieces.
Start over.
A new beginning again.
A little bit closer to the end.
posted by Gutterflower @ 10:02 PM
1 comments
