Memories That Remain

Trudging through the crisp untouched snow, a single breath of cold air feels like daggers on your insides, its sharp pangs blowing down my throat making it dry, as if it would close up with one more gulp of air. One slow step at a time, making my way from darkness and sorrow at one end of the landing platform towards freedom, liberation at the other end which overwhelms my mind. Questions flying around my head about suffering. About God. Human nature. How could this have happened? How could anybody have let this happen?

Faces unfamiliar, strangers in another lifetime. This place, these people, this room, their pain. Where bodies perished and burned alive. Torture and pain combined with small acts of hope, the disgust of human kind, decay and sorrow as strangers lives are torn apart. My mind wonders as I am half way towards the entrance which is so much more than an iron gate patrolled by guards, but it now lays, empty, unoccupied. Darkness starts to fall, the gloves on my hands can’t keep out the freezing temperatures, I am wrapped up so well, I am clothed but they were naked. My hands are painful, my nose feels like it could drop off but they endured so much more. I can only imagine. It is so empty; nothing remains but the memory.

Shivers run down my neck through to my spine making my whole body shake, is it the sorrow I feel or just the cold? How will I ever express how I feel to anybody? All I can hear is the sound of crunching on snow so distinct, so rhythmic, like nothing else matters but to keep moving because if you stop. Silence would immerse the darkness, then and only then you may feel the faint whisper of death whip across your face leaving you feeling helpless. Time has passed by and there is nothing you can do to help these people, they have left, this world, this place. So it’s keep moving, don’t look back, you’re walking their freedom because their legs couldn’t make it.

Leaving, passing through the gateway, it’s only now I know I won’t have to face that in my life, that kind of suffering, never that extreme. A glimpse of life taken, how will I express how I feel to anybody? I know now, sitting at my desk this is the way. So much emotion whirling up inside ready to be let out, this is how I will express it. As I sit pen to paper still struggling with words, just simple words explaining all that aching inside yet when one word is written the rest will follow in full chorus. Through the depth of experience, this is how I write.