"To be feared is to fear: no one has been able to strike terror into others and at the same time enjoy peace of mind."

-Seneca (5 BC - 65 AD)

The Price                                                                                                     

The unbearable but inevitable predictability of each day

Accusations running through my head

plaguing me

anguish

indescribably pain

                                    "be brave. be strong.

                                    it's not your fault.

                                    it had to be done"

No. It didn't. Nothing had to be done.

A mindless act.

Now what has it caused me?

I'm a twisted shell of what I was

it confronts me

everywhere

staring

surrounding

I did it. I'm to blame

Blame me! Condemn me!

                                    "no one's to blame.

                                    you didn't know what you

                                    (did u mean to repeat 'you'?) you were doing"

But I knew what the result would be.

I could have stopped it.

I pressed the button. Now I suffer the consequences.

How was I to know that my life would detonate as well?

Shattering and falling pieces around me. Irretrievable

Out of reach.

How was I to know that my finger was edging inch by inch closer....

to what?...

to this.

I wish it had been one quick unpreventable action-

but no.

it was slow. I delighted in the power I held.

I had the time to stop.

                                    "there wasn't any time"

I saw.

I saw the terror.

I heard.

I heard the screams.

My eyes had opened.                                                                               The sorrow and the anguish.

Soiled and stained with the knowledge of what I have caused.

Will I ever be clean again?

Will that day...no..will that eternity

ever stop playing through my mind?

etching deeper, deeper into my heart?

                                    "it had to be done"

nothing had to be done!

There were women. There were children.

all gone

I do not deserve life.

I do not belong. Forever I will be set apart.

outcast.

how can I live?

what a price we pay for revenge

what are the rewards?

...is there a price we pay for peace?

                                    "people like us.

                                    it is not peace we want"

This is the price I pay

I deserve to die

This time I will make it quick

At last I will have peace

......silence........

Remember?                                                                                    

she sits at the kitchen table

her hands neatly placed

they show him excitedly engaged

a proud husband

a brave soldier

he fought well-

was awarded the DSO

for bravery under fire

yet he could not save his

wife the pain of loss

as he lay dying

on a battlefield

as just another muddy figure

Given a town's farewell for its courageous son

"never to be forgotten"

now, she is the only one who

remembers

how will they remember her

if they don't even remember he

who was so brave?

she sits at the kitchen table

her hands neatly placed-

hands where the skin now runs in folds

and bunches around the wedding ring

still tight on her wrinkled finger

this is how they found her

when they came to see why she

would not pick up the phone

they came to clean

and pack the house

and enclose her life

in boxes

to be sent to the Salvation Army