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You could never guess how much I needed you then. You have no idea how much I miss you now. White walls; closed doors. Whispers, silence, tears. Alone I stand, on the outside, looking in. They walk out in pairs. Father and Mother then Sister and Brother. Broken: tears fall and sparkle in harsh white lights. They turn away: your mother falls, just like my tears. They gather; can't look my way. I cry for you; Ask why for you; I wish I could have died for you.
Bright lights, dark nights. Loud screams, pain. Red and blue: flashing, spinning. Black circles turn lazily, once crazily. Voices shout; hands pull, taking me away from you. They hold me close as I watch you drift away. Red and white; sheets stained as it spills from you. They open heavy metal doors; you scream in pain; I struggle, futile. Restraining hands, bundle me away. Red and blue flash again; bright light; and you are gone. So am I. Soothing words; I drift away, on night, on drugs, on tears. On pain.
A birth; a death; a life; a love. Gray stones march away in lines; flowers die slowly, just like my heart. Forgotten names surround you. Love passes but it never dies. Not like them. Not like you.
Time gone, love gone, life gone. Broken hearted; I stand alone as I say good-bye. Tears glisten. Memories lost; never made. I lost you. I need you. I love you. You could never guess how much I needed you then. You have no idea how much I miss you now. Tears for love lost; tears for life gone. Tears for you.
Six people; four seatbelts; one survivor. Trapped by what should have saved them. Screams; then silence. Flames consumed; four bodies lost. We were flung clear. Was it luck? Maybe. Unlucky for you. Red blood spilled from you like tears. They took you away. I need you; I love you; I lost you.
One day; together, maybe. Broken hearted, here I stand. Thousands of tears. Five roses.
And me.
Ten steps and he was somebody. A world he used to belong to. A world that had abandoned him. He wanted nothing more than to go back to where he once belonged. He knew it was the only way to be accepted. To be cared for. To be free.
Was he on the edge of something that could make him worthwhile? They thought so. Was he on the brink of a life that meant more than plain white walls and drugs that took the pain away? They said so. But something stopped him escaping.
He didn't know how to break down the walls surrounding him but he knew that the next corner he turned might be his last. Over here he was constantly on alert. Over there he could rest. Once, they had accepted him. But now he was an exile and they judged him because they didn't care. No one helped. Because it was his fault.
Alone in world full of people, who blamed him for being where he was. It was his fault he was here, with no way to fix things. It didn't matter to them that he never saw what was coming. It didn't matter to them that he couldn't stop what put him here. He just had to live with it because they said he deserved to be there. They had to blame someone. So they blamed it on the victim.
To them, it was his fault that a red faced, white male drank ten beers, then decided to drive home. To them, it was his fault that his four-year-old daughter fell off the second floor balcony. To them, it was his fault that when he drove down the road to Sacred Heart Hospital, the same red faced man sped through an intersection. It was his fault he couldn't stop in time. It was his fault his wife died, his fault his daughter died. It was his fault he lost a leg, his fault he lost his family. His fault he lost everything.
He couldn't walk the ten steps that could save him. He couldn't walk the steps to cross the road that separated him from the money and the prosperity that he could see. The life he used to have. The person he used to be.
They blamed it on him. The victim.
"... We must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free ... The life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination ... The Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity ... The Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land."
-- Martin Luther King
It was 1958.
Life was hard for a black man. Everything was his fault.