the cost of a senseless war

The fatigue has taken over and I’m numb again. The relentless hammer of my life is pounding me into submission – making me mindlessly work and take orders.

My head aches. My heart is heavy. My eyes can barely stay open.

Then I read the news.

I read about the billowing clouds of black and red smoke stealing the skyline, blocking any hope of sunshine.

I read about the toxic acid rain pouring down on the city after airstrikes hit their oil depots.

Don’t open your doors.
Don’t go outside.
Don’t breathe.

People’s eyes and throats are burning from the evil in the air.

Fatigue doesn’t come from the daily grind.

It comes from a grinding pulse of sirens warning of more airstrikes to come.

It comes from not only the burning feeling in their throats and eyes, that erodes their vision or breath, but from constantly being in fear – a fear so ferocious, so furious that it overtakes all senses.

It’s a fury that grows, festers and overflows.

It’s about the cost of a senseless war.

It’s a cost the people have to wage on their own.

As I think of my own fatigue, my own existential dread. I feel selfish for feeling upset at all about my own circumstances.

Here I sit in my chair, safe in my house, safe in my neighborhood.

I can go outside.
I can breathe.
I have clean water.

It’s not fair.
It’s not right.

I hear sirens in the distance, a plane taking off overhead, and the roar of traffic on the freeway.

But here I can sit safe, cozy and secure.

But not them.

And the fury, the anger builds in my stomach as I stare at the photo of the black smoky sky – no light, just dark.

I see a woman in the photo staring up – staring at her reality, staring at her future.

She can barely see through the burning rain.

She had to go outside.
She had to get food for her family.

She has to keep them safe, while she puts herself at great risk for cancer and disease.

The billowing smoke is everywhere.

It’s the fury boiling in my stomach watching what they have done.

I close my eyes. They can’t stay open any longer.

All I can see is the red flames, the plumes rising.

I feel helpless.

I’m not myself.