firegap | ( december 10th )

She spends the days forgetting how it feels to ascend the stairs, she remembers only running, tumbling, falling down its steps.

Up, she leaves trails of mud and stale water, she leaves dirt and death behind. How it smells like years gone by, she is faded like them. Away, away.

Climbing the staircase may take a lifetime, one that she repeats every night, but likewise landing at its bottom nearly robbed her of her life, first. As her grave may be in the moat, it is still here the certainties she held most dear lie buried, beneath these newly changed rugs.

The stairs carry the echoes of it. It carries the echo of her now, too.