Gardens

She runs free in the gardens of her heart
the cool grass damp beneath her feet
A light wind tugging gently at her hair
Laying kisses against her neck.
She laughs and dances
Feeling the sun against her bare skin
Staining it with light and warmth.
It has been so long,
So very long
Since she has seen the sun.
She is all that she feels
Light, laughter, brilliance.
She is love.
She runs.
She sees the bricks of the walls,
Vines curling, budding, flowering
So that even she does not feel truly alone
In this place that has come alive.
She can taste their scent.
She feels her heart swelling in her chest
So that she is amazed
She can even breathe with the weight of it.
She races forward
Knowing not what she will find.
Another wall perhaps.
But then she would know
And she could face it
Perhaps this new wall could be climbed.
Or perhaps,
There is no wall there at all.
She sees no clouds
No warning of rain or storm
And yet a wind sweeps up around her
Dark and terrible
Ugly, silent, cold.
She cannot breathe.
The air is moist and stale.
She tastes ashes in her mouth
Feels the sting of them in her eyes
Tears up, but keeps running.
Her feet press tender
Into piles of ashes and things that are sharp
She cannot see
But she knows she bleeds.
The wind roars against her ears
Silent no longer.
Slowly slowly it fades away
And she finds that it was silent all along
The only sound was her
Choking, sobbing against her fate.
She stops.
The sun has gone.
The powder beneath her feet is gray and black
The chalky remnants of leaves and flowers
Vines and sticks
A few crumbling pieces of stone.
The grass, the vines, the flowers
All of it are gone.
She stands frozen
Shocked and afraid
And she sees what has been done.
There was no fire.
Only wind and dampness.
Yet everything has burned, crumbled, broken.
Her sobs escape her lips
Parched despite the dampness
Clinging to her hair and skin.
Her hoarse voice breaks the hollow silence
Echoing like water drips in a deep dark well.
She watches as her skin loses it’s sunlit glow
The light seeping away like so much mist
Fading into the dark.
No breeze stirs to touch her hair.
No one places kisses against the back of her neck.
She is alone.
She tips her head back and howls her anguish into the night
She smears the ashes in her hair and skin
Mourning all that she has lost
Mourning those things she never had
But thought she could have
Mourning love.
The walls stand,
Their surfaces charred, smeared with ashes
But solid still
Cold and dark and empty
Except for her.
She is frozen, so nothing moves.
Her breath comes ragged but it comes.
A laugh escapes her lips
Broken and small
And she is amazed that she can laugh at all.
Tears form little rivers in the ashes of her skin.
She brushes dark streaked hair from her face
And looks out into the night.
Somewhere in the distance she hears a sound
And though there is no sun to light her way
She can still see.
She runs toward the sound,
Not knowing what she hopes to find
But hoping anyway
Because she cannot mourn forever.