Burning Bridges

Tonight is not the night I step outside, for she is here again.
Under her reign, no stone is left untouched, and no skin unburned.

I hear the cries of their children, left abandoned. They echo in my chest and tighten it, but I turn away, refusing to listen. I keep my eyes on the ground, still hidden under the bridge. Blood seeps between the cracks. I don’t know where it comes from. It smells like it was always here. Why didn’t I notice sooner?
I draw in air I do not need, taking again what should not be mine. *I don’t deserve this,* I whisper. *I don’t.* Cold rain runs against my skin as ashes press into my lungs. The taste is strong, like the old cigarette my mother used to smoke in the living room.
Above the bridge, boots strike the ground in steady rhythm, answered by gunfire. I sense she is above. I do not need to see her face to know she is smiling. I am certain of it. She is not here for me, but that knowledge offers no comfort.
I see nothing of her but a shadow, stretched and broken across the puddles at my feet. I do not want to look at her directly. She moves like something beyond human, a serpent wrapped in something beyond evil, like the propaganda posters the resistance hid in corner of the city.
We look upon the same shattered streets, the city reduced to fragments and ruins. I tell myself there was beauty here once, though it is hard to believe now, with buildings hanging by a thread. Is this what she wanted -stripping everything away to start anew?
My hand closes around a piece of stone. It may have been part of a wall, or a home, only days ago. It is cold, but not useless. I could strike her with it. The very debris she has left behind could be her downfall. Without a sound, I let it fall back to the ground.
Inaction is my refuge. Still, I remain beneath this bridge, unmoving. I am not the hero of this story. Someone else will take my place -someone braver, kinder. They will see these same streets and ruins and do what I cannot.
Once again, I remain complicit.
— Intro to "Burning Bridges" by E.L

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