Gravedigger by Kittyling Gravedigger When you dig my grave Could you make it shallow So that I can feel the rain -- Dave Matthews Band, "Gravedigger" *** Frozen hearts bleed in the dark. A whisper is borne on the wind, ghosts and memories carried in the petals of cherry blossoms. The night is silent, pink dissolving as crimson seeps into cracked soil, weaving intricate patterns into the parched earth with an artist's flourish. A gurgling rush of liquid as the petals continue their descent in a silk-soft rain and the roots, the soil, drink it in. Spring green of grass blades beneath the tree, stained red, droplets clinging like dew to their tips--like blood from emerald eyes to feather-soft lashes-- Thirst, hunger, need--crimson blood and cherry red lips and the pretty pink flush of pale cheeks. The knife weaves intricate patterns into soft skin and the boy wants nothing more than to dream. *** Innocent. He remembers wondering why they hated him, why they beat him for something he could not control and he remembers spending his nights crying, wanting to be held and loved. Above anything else, he remembers the tears and the cold. Always so cold... *** The 'drip drip' of liquid on stone is familiar, rivulets of icy rain from the solitary window something he's felt before from nights spent alone in the cell. The sluggish quality to it is not familiar, nor is the pitch black behind his fluttering eyelids and when he opens them the lashes cling to each other, sticky with some thick substance that's now trickling down his cheeks. Even with his eyes open he can't see, no pinpoint of light in the darkness; the drips are growing so loud that it's nearly deafening and he fumbles to find the source, crawling on hands and knees as his naked skin is scratched by sharp edges of rock. Fingertips are met with the same sticky liquid on the stone as from his eyes, and he can taste through touch the coppery-metallic quality of the liquid. Blood. *** Leaf green is clouded by a milky layer of ice. Raspy breaths issue from petal-pink lips, parted to drink in air that isn't being received. Emerald is misted, unseeing, flesh growing colder as frost refuses to melt from early spring days. Hands clench and unclench, nails digging into skin just hard enough to leave crescent-shaped indents of red. The knife presses harder. *** "You're a monster. Maybe you--I--deserve..." The images before him are fuzzy, voices and noise like radio static in his ears. Behind his eyelids he can see twin circles of amethyst, glowing in the dark, and he wants to place a name to them but he can't--too far in the past, but it's on the tip of his tongue and being held back as if to say hush...you don't know that yet. A hand closes around his throat, cold against his skin and he can feel the warmth being drained from him, the thrum of his heart beat becoming more erratic. This feeling reminds him of winter, and so does this person, heliotrope gone and ivory replacing it, the palpitating heat in his veins slowing and becoming ice. A butterfly struggling against the bars of a cage, wings growing heavier as it falters. This is what it feels like at the end. Do we dream before we die? *** return to splash page