Rabbit Holes [zinger]

I remember tears streaming down your face
When I said, "I'll never let you go"
When all those shadows almost killed your light
I remember you said, "Don't leave me here alone"
But all that's dead and gone and passed tonight

Each and every day that I find myself waking to the calling of the animals, their voices rising above the dull ache of a nightmare that has terrorised me all through-out the night. And the sweet morning scent of pine in the air makes me heart ache, with a longing and lust for the feel of another human, for the feel of the man I loved and the woodland scents that often caressed his skin, like a kiss. It pulls me into a world that I don’t want any part of and I fight with teeth, nails and will to escape it, but the perfection of this world and of this place is something that I cannot defeat. As my lifeless brown eyes take in this world I hesitate to act, my mind racing at a speed where my thoughts become a jumbled mess, the smash together in a gathering of thoughts, emotions and dreams that I have begun to believe would never come true. I move with a slowness that most would associate with that of the dying. The jerky movement of my long young limbs seems so wrong and unnatural that I often find myself collapsing into a pile and not moving for what seems like hours.

The way that I seem to be unable to hold myself often surprises me, my hands scrabbling over the moist soil to bring myself upright as my body sags beneath me and I find myself catching myself on weak arms before I tumble into the dirt again. My frail limbs are doomed to forever leave me in the soil, in the dirt, the place where I will die, the place where I will be buried, six feet below the soil. I have been dying ever since I left the Capitol, the living me is trapped in the walls of that city, roaming endlessly waiting, and hoping that one day I will return. I fled my home with my siblings, running through the forest like a coward. Fear soon overcame my courage and bravery for having the ability to escape such a pampered and good life and my ability to control anything I did slipped. Decisions were often mistakes and the choices I made tore my family apart. And I kept running with them. I never thought at all about turning around and walking away, turning my back on the wild and going home, to the place that I belonged.

I held no thought for the consequences of my actions. I was lost in my mind; agony still filled me whenever I dared to think of joy. I had been easily swayed into leaving. My man was dead, I had nothing left to stay for and my sisters were so stubborn. I couldn’t possibly have stayed and watched them go. As the days pass I revaluate, I’m beginning to see that I could have watched them go. Life would have been so simple. Death can tear a life apart it ruins everything for you in a split seconds and you act rash, without thought, it was what I did. Now look at me, I made the wrong decision and I regret it every day as I stare out into the woods, eyes glazed waiting for a reason to give up and go home. Leave them all. They don’t need me. When the man I loved was killed my heart was torn from my chest, stepped on and ripped into bits in front of me, the pain had been unbearable, just like any tragic love story, and I never got over it. I lost my will to do everything, nothing seemed worth it.

I allow the world around me to seep into my bones, dragging them down until they feel like lead and lifting them takes so much effort that breathing becomes harder and more faster; like a disease that riddles you with a sickness, a plague that you cannot escape no matter how far or much you run. When I close my eyes and forget I can feel the air race over my pale skin, and I can imagine myself rippling like a brook. The surface of my skin shimmering, small waves cresting and raising with the beat of the wind. My skin was as weak and transcalent as the pond that stays so close to me, it is the only source of water that I have and my body always lingers near it, in fear that I might lose it and die of dehydration. Even though I would welcome death like an old friend. When the wind blows I shiver and like the water it ripples through-out my body spreading from the very tips of my fingers to my heart. The constant thump, thump thumpthumpthump of my heart keeps me going, although at times it appears to me that it falters, skipping and dancing like the leaves on the trees that surround me.

Just close your eyes
The sun is going down
You'll be alright
No one can hurt you now
Come morning light

It flutters like the butterflies that have made their homes around the flowers that spring up from the ground in the summer. At those times my breath comes in ragged gasps and the prominent thumping of my beating heart fills me to the point where I hear no other sound. It comes shallow and rasping as if my lungs are incapable of sucking in precious air before letting it slide out and into the open. It hurts sometimes… And I feel the pain of it like a knife being drawn across my skin, but it goes deeper and further into my flesh until the burning spreads through-out my entire body, engulfing me and my breathing gets harder.

It burns like the fire that I have never been able to contain within me and my soul.

When I am not staring numbly at the world around me, my eyes lifeless and ignorant to the obvious beauty that controlled this place, then my mind wonders to the world I left behind. It is often that I dream about the place that I miss, the home that I fled and the people that I ditched to start a new life in a place I don’t want to be part of. Every time I remind myself of the Capitol an ache fills my chest that seems to spread through my like lava, it reaches every inch of my body and I feel so drained of energy and life. I feel all my energy flee me in a sudden rush and there is nothing I can do about it. I gave up fighting long ago. It reminds me of the nightmares that so often stab me, dreams that are filled with the day that he died. When the peacekeepers called, when they told me what had happened. I remember the way I had done nothing. A numb feeling had settled over me, I hadn’t believed it. That day haunts me like my own personal ghost. I fear sleeping and the terrors that await me when I do and the dark bags that hang below my eyes only reinforce my horror. Sleep continues to evade me as I hide from it; the way water so simply slips through my fingers when I cup it in my hands. I try to grapple with it, keeping it there, holding it and begging it to not leave. But there are too many holes and it slips away from me until I lie staring at the stares in the sky.

The stars do nothing to comfort me, those foreign objects leave me even more shattered. They remind me of everything I have left behind. Even their shinning beauty cannot match the beauty of the lights that danced in the Capitol streets. Even though the ones that I gaze it now are like small jewels they were not my stars, they weren’t my neon lights and shinning emeralds. The fake comfort that the Capitol lights gave me made me feel warm and as if no one and nothing could and would ever touch me. They held a certain aspect of reality that not even real stars could match. The light they provided was stronger and brighter than a million stars. The real stars only haunt me, telling me that I am no longer in my world and that this place is very real and dangerous. My sisters say that they tell stories that the clusters of glowing lights form shapes and animals. And in the sky –if you hold the imagination, you can create a story, a dream, about a place and a world of anything you want. It is your own place and anything in it can happen. I don’t believe tem, though. A dream is but a cover up of lies, there to mask a hidden truth, false hopes that will never come true.

As always the dirt clings to my skin, it stains my pale skin in a way that no amount of scrubbing will ever get rid of it. I have tried. I have spent hours at the pond, legs dangling into the ice water until they go numb. At that point I drag them out, unable to stand. I spend that time cleansing my skin of the stains that covered it, the dirt that clung to the skin under my nails and stubbornly fought me as I tried to remove it. It never leaves me, streaks of it staying in the pours of my skin. No amount of scrubbing or time would ever give me the chance to cleanse my skin and make it pure once more.

You and I'll be safe and sound
Don't you dare look out your window darling
Everything's on fire
The war outside our door keeps raging on
Hold on to this lullaby

When I take a moment to stare at my impure self in the water I wonder what I ever did to deserve this. I have asked such a silly question more times than I care to count. A soft voice whispering to the trees and the animals that lurked in the shadows, watching and waiting. For those moments there was silence and even the when dies down as if listening, urging me to speak louder so that everyone could hear. But the question was not for them. It was aimed at me and my heart and a soul that had escaped me. I knew that it was somewhere in those woods, I knew that I had to find it so that I may find the boy that I love. When I called its name in my cries for answers it ignored. It never took notice of my anguished words.

I have come to the belief that it is hiding. Lurking in the corner of my vision staying hidden behind foliage and its own arrogance. It stalks me and follows me, waiting and biding its time. My soul is cruel in that way. I believe that it will join me again once I am truly dying. I tell my sisters every day that I am dying and no medicine will make it better. I whisper in my dreams about death and the comfort that it will bring. But those words never truly satisfy me, because they are lies. My body knows it, my soul knows it. It does not come to me because of these lies. I have treated it with such carelessness and hate that it no longer believes me and trusts me. It can sense the lie that laces my words, the hysterical want to believe that I throw at myself. I cannot fool it. It is me. I am it. Even though I have forced myself to believe this ludicrous lie I know it is not true, but I drink it in everyday, whispering it with a force that I could easily turn into a will to live. Live a life that I would never regret, but I don’t.

I simply can’t.

On legs that shake with the power to send me falling face first into the dirt I stumble towards the pond. The ground was moist and damp underfoot. It soaked into my bare feet, I having long ago thrown my shoes away, giving into the tiresome fight of staying clean. It was dark, late at night and fear crept at the edge of my mind. I despised going into the forest at night, roaming the woods without the aid of the sun to guide my step. It had been thirst that had woke me, the dryness of it settling into my mouth and making it painful to swallow. Dark shadows loomed from the dark; everything looked bigger as I stared ahead; desperately trying to knock back my panic and fear My feet kept going of their own will, ignoring my trembling and paranoia at the unknown. An icy breeze blew across the land, making my small frame tremble even more. The moon was full and shone brightly in the sky, a lonely cloud sliced through the moon, making it appear as though it had been cut in half. The icy wind continued to blow, the cloud skittering away, the moon once more appearing whole.

I was again reminded of reality, my gaze for a second lingering on the stars in the sky. And my thirst drove me forward, my steps somewhat uncertain and uncoordinated as I continued through the woods. The shadows that gathered engulfed me, filling me with their icy touch, goose bumps littered my skin. It was simple enough to imagine the shadows becoming real, clawing at my skin, trying to get to me and kill me. My mind was racing, a thousand thoughts clashing with each other, mixing and mingling until I could take it no more. I was scaring myself. “Only a little further.” I whisper, the words escaping my lips as a wisp of white air, rising into the sky, and disappearing into the darkness within seconds. Almost there.

I remember tears streaming down your face
When I said, "I'll never let you go"
When all those shadows almost killed your light
I remember you said, "Don't leave me here alone"
But all that's dead and gone and passed tonight