This Is Where It Ends

by Marieke Nijkamp

So we run. Not just in circles around the track. We run toward all that is waiting for us. We run together while we still can.

But what they failed to tell us is that running away and saving your own skin is only noble when you don’t leave anyone behind.

The only things that give us purpose are the stories that tie us together.

And we’ll talk about the future one last time before it’s actually upon us.

This is what our world is now: the dead, the lost, the wounded.

There are no words in that fleeting moment between hope and the knowledge. There is no way to express how a heart can burst and break at

the same time, how the sun can cut through the darkness but will cast shadows everywhere.

“How do I explain to Mamá that Tomás isn’t coming home?” He doesn’t have an answer to that. Neither do I.

“I just don’t want to be alone anymore.” Then he blows his brains out.