Ashes of the Living By Gayatri
| The eyes had died long before the bodies fell. He begged for the killing to cease, yet did not know who the killers were. His voice dissolved into the smoke— unheard, unnamed. He was innocent. He was too late. In a single breath, his world was taken— family reduced to memory, to dust. The sky hung low, choked with ash and debris, a ceiling of grief where light once lived. He pleaded again, but to whom, even he did not know. She sat amidst the ruin, confused, exhausted— the cries around her fading into a distant, hollow ringing. Blood traced from her ears, and the world fell silent. She waited, not for rescue, but for arms that would never come. A mother’s wail rose— not merely sound, but a fracture in the fabric of being. Her voice tore through the air, while her eyes remained still, emptied of tears, fixed on a hope already gone. She waited for footsteps that would never return. A father knelt among the fallen, holding the cold weight of his children. He prayed for warmth, for breath, for a miracle undone by time— but their stillness answered him. He cursed the moment his strength had failed them. The scent of blood lingered, thick as truth— blurring the line between friend and destroyer. Hunger spread. Justice withered. Despair endured. And we— we remained, not living, not dead, but something in between. For what does the world burn? No voice remains to answer. The womb is cursed— no children will rise to inherit this ruin. No future waits. No dreams survive. The soul has long since departed, leaving behind only breath— a quiet, lingering echo waiting for its end. |
