This is No Place For a Child

A child has no place in a world of hate. Her fragile body is not meant to cope with the sting of its pain and will wither away. A girl with no name lies crumpled in a dark corner. She is stripped of the warmth of love, and shivers at the remnant of all that now surrounds her. She grasps her knees tightly and sways back and forth. She feels lost and lonely but fights back the tears of utter despair with a blanket of rage. Her efforts have gone to naught. A heavy drop falls from the corner of her eye and caresses her scarlet cheek. Her emotions are too strong to suppress, and a flickering light reveals the glistening of streaming tears. Such a young girl contemplates the value of her own life as she continues to sway back and forth with the rhythm of the ticking clock. Tightening the grip on her legs, her back curves over and reveals the bones of the hungry. Her shadow tells the tale of a haggard old woman, yet her life only measures that of eight years. Her withered body is not graced with words of wisdom and wrinkled skin, but words of hate that scar the child and welts of pain that cause her wrinkles. She is hiding in a dark corner, but mentally continues to run; never feeling safe from the monster that haunts her soul. This is no life for a child; nonetheless, she and many like her are forced to continue living it. She is relentlessly chased, and believes that rest only comes when one lies in the grave. She did not ask for a life like this, no one does. She too was born into the comfort of a gentle mother’s arms; yet learned all too quickly life can change. As she rubs her decrepit fingers down her shivering shoulder, her soul cries out for all that is good. A life of hate can be as cold and hard as ice. This is no life for a child.