From my unpublished archives
August 11, 2013
August 11, 2013
A little girl bends down toward earth. Tangles of unkempt hair fall around her face. Her dress is torn and stained. Mud streaks paint her cheeks where her dirt covered hands have wiped away silent tears. She scratches at the dry parched ground planting seeds down the row. Behind her you can see row after row of her toiling.
I watch amazed as the seeds she plants quickly grow into a vine and each vine grabs and intertwines with the next making them almost indistinguishable from each other. "What could grow in such dry ground so quickly?" I wonder. I move closer to see. With each step closer my vision gets a little clearer. I can see now that the vines are working their way around the girls heels. They have started to wrap their tendrils around her ankles and up her legs. I quicken my pace, these plants can't be good, I need to stop her. She shouldn't be planting these seeds. As I approach her I can see markers that line the rows, proclaiming what each one holds. The names stop me in my tracks. Why, why would she be planting these? "Stop! Stop planting!" I cry out, but she doesn't hear me.
I grab at the row labeled "unworthy" and try to pull it out, but it has intertwined with the ones labeled "mistake" and "unwanted". My desperate attempts are not working. I must stop her from planting, because the vines have now wrapped around her waist.
I watch amazed as the seeds she plants quickly grow into a vine and each vine grabs and intertwines with the next making them almost indistinguishable from each other. "What could grow in such dry ground so quickly?" I wonder. I move closer to see. With each step closer my vision gets a little clearer. I can see now that the vines are working their way around the girls heels. They have started to wrap their tendrils around her ankles and up her legs. I quicken my pace, these plants can't be good, I need to stop her. She shouldn't be planting these seeds. As I approach her I can see markers that line the rows, proclaiming what each one holds. The names stop me in my tracks. Why, why would she be planting these? "Stop! Stop planting!" I cry out, but she doesn't hear me.
I grab at the row labeled "unworthy" and try to pull it out, but it has intertwined with the ones labeled "mistake" and "unwanted". My desperate attempts are not working. I must stop her from planting, because the vines have now wrapped around her waist.
