Struck
I stare out the window and it blends into the darkness. Camouflage in a world devoured by the ghosts of anguished souls. I can only see it because I know it’s there.
It smells like sulfur in the cube. A name on the book of matches in my hand is long faded from the constant commuting from the torn pocket of my jeans. I open it, wondering if tonight is the night I will light one.
I go to sleep and have my answer.
Maybe tomorrow.
The morning is gray. An impossible and endless fog — it retreats only when the night comes to suffocate the moist air and the hope we may have found in it. For a few hours I can imagine the sun. The clouds. The sky.
Darkness again. It always follows. The darkness taunts. It tells you to look at it. The darkness is not darkness. A reflection. A mirror to the caustic bits within yourself you think are hidden when the night falls.
Enough.
I go to the window and strike a match.
I feel it recede. Tentacles of blackness abandon the flame. Scurrying away from the heat and power, a brilliant light illuminating invisible corners of myself and my home. The flame goes out.
From the window I see into the darkness. Until it’s broken by another light. I did not create this one; I do not know where it comes from, for I thought I was alone with a matchbook.
I open the window and fall into the grass.
This light does not go out. It dances in a doorway casting shadows on the darkness, begging me to follow it. A woman holds a candle. She steps on the dirt and gives me one to light.
Together we stand among a circle of cubes groaning under the weight of the night.
Get off they scream. Let us be.
We are joined by two young girls. Their eyes glow as they approach our flames. The woman pulls out two more candles from a hidden coat pocket — the girls accept them, each touching their wicks to ours.
The glow is stronger. The night feels lighter.
People gingerly step out of their cubes. They want to join in; share the light. A strong wind blows, fighting illumination. Huddled together with our backs to the wind, the candles barely flicker.
Curiosity is strong enough to draw a crowd. Some stay shrouded in the safety of the darkness not wanting to get burned.
It is afraid.
Our light is warm and powerful.
I am not a matchstick, but fuel for a thousand.
It is gray.
We remain in the light as more come out of the shadows.
It is blue.
The wax bleeds onto our hands.
Our world is green.
It is beautiful.
It smells like freedom.
