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The fear of
falling
Carla Mileo
It became the very fear that preyed on our minds. Unwillingly,
unknowingly, we gave it life and purpose. The fear of losing
ourselves to other forces, of climbing too high, digging too deep,
then falling. But what have we now become? Living in a jungle of
concrete brutality, blocking out all that once was beautiful, making
us lose our grip on reality. Our memories are precious, rare,
treasured. Nobody loves anymore; emotion is senseless to our cold
hearts. We are driven, determined and fighting, but towards what
end? We have fallen from grace.
Change is thick in the air, infectious, a warning of danger, of
coming hardship and pain. Walking through dimly lit alleys, darkness
seems to encumber me, the ghostly wisps of fog drifting past give me
an uneasy feeling. The path ahead is illuminated by an eerie light, an
ethereal man-made luminescence. Not a light of the living. The
mind is quick to sense fear, shadows are given life and whispers
uttered onto the evening breeze echo eerily through the obscurity;
noises in the distance, invisible eyes pursuing every move. I look to
the sky, hoping to see a soaring bird, the glowing sun, a symbol of
hope on which to hold. Yet only thin rays of sunlight trickle through
the thick fog: there is nothing left of the old world.
The darkness begins to fade and the fog clears. Crowds swarm in
their orderly lines as they exit the hostile buildings on their way
home; cloaked in grey and black, faces down, long purposeful strides,
cold. Even now among the movement, there is silence. The flow
pushes me, sways me, and pulls me down along with the current. A
sudden pain in my chest forces me to gasp for air, how they suffocate
me. I try, but I cannot be like them, the crowd. I am different and
they know. Yet I feel a part of it, somehow joined to the force of the
river, bound to its fate. And they know.
Demands are higher, work is harder, needs are greater than
simple humans can conjure. And so, that is how it happened, the
merging of man and steel, of life and death, human and machine. A
choice, they say, for the better, they assure us. But I will not, I cannot.
Those who refuse suffer. They swim and fight hard against the
current, but the current will always win and wash them defeated
onto the sharp rocks of the shore. Their destinies lie beyond the city
walls with the derelict of this world. The poor and the worthless –
their lives are labelled and feared. I can see them frommy apartment
high above the grip of the great wall. They huddle together against
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