FREEWRITES: DARK DAYS

These days the hope we feed our hearts cannot stomach the hunger we feel. These days are filled with terror and uncertainty. These nights are quiet and lonely. We do not hear the crickets chirp or the trees shake or the wind blow. It's silence. Long deafening silence.

"Will things ever change papa, " my little man asked me the other night. He has been asking a lot of questions I cannot answer. How do I explain to him that this anomaly is the life I have lived and the one he was born into. How do I explain this hope of ours?

We hope my boy! We hope, necessitating the choice we do not have. These are not our choices or voices. We lost them all. What you see are weaponized clothing of fear we wear on nights like this. We identify with the unknown and unspoken. Our voices are mere whispers in this echo chamber. Hallow hellos; painful goodbyes. Blood on the streets and fabricated narratives.

It will never be okay my son. These streets are bloodthirsty. They glisten with red-blue lights and the faces we know, regrettably.

I have no answer; I need no answer. I want a roof over my head and to protect my boy. He is everything I have got. Everything I have got in this damn life! I have no answer; I need no answer. I need to live.

I do not like these streets, they are bloodthirsty. I do not like these faces, they are unsafe. Could we run from home? Maybe someday. When the sun is high and our faces are clogged with the sweat of relief; when hope is a choice, not a necessity. Until then we hide between the fine lines of lengthy texts.