Alive

Darkness surrounds me.
I am standing here, on a crowded street in a big city, and yet there's no 
light. I can see the people around me, hurrying towards their invisible 
goals, destined to remain an eternal mystery to my eyes. I am alone... 
everybody is alone in the darkness. 
I move on, and as I do so, I pass by more and more people, creatures, 
empty beings without soul, without hope and without dreams. Just like 
cursed robots they keep on chasing their destinations, every day anew. 
I am not like that. I am different. I don't have an aim. I don't know where 
to go, so I just keep on walking where my heart leads me, hoping to 
someday find a way out of darkness. 
I walk and walk, pass by thousands and thousands of machines. I am 
yearning to find an aim in my life like they have, because it is easier once 
you know where you're going. But I am not like them. I will never be... is 
that why I am alone, all by myself?
I start to run. Fast and Faster. Nobody notices me. The machines keep on 
walking in their constant pace on their never-ending chase for things that 
don't exist. 

Suddenly the threateningly large masses of stones and cement around me 
vanish and I leave the city. Instead of gray and hard pavement I can 
suddenly feel soft grass under my feet and I see the shadows of a large 
field before me. The sky above me slowly changes color. Somewhere in the 
dimness, birds start to chirp and the air is mild. A flowery scent reaches 
my nostrils and a tender summer breeze starts to play with the strands of 
my hair. In the distance I can hear rolling thunder and in the red sky at 
morning clouds are quickly approaching. 

Eventually the first drops of a warm, life-giving rain fall down onto my face, 
mingle with my tears and run over my cheeks until they drop down on the 
green leaves of grass. And where they meet the ground, new life springs 
from the earth, born from my tears, my pain, which I am finally able to set 
free. 
And all of a sudden I realize what makes me different from the machines; 
why I can not find and dumbly chase a goal, but why I am full of dreams 
and hope for more in the world. And why I am alone.

I am a living being.

The moment that realization dawns on me, the darkness vanishes forever 
in the dazzling light of a new hope. The rain washes away my tears, my 
fears, my pain, and my wish to be like the others. I sink down between the 
flowers which are now blooming in the most sparkling colors with raindrops 
glistening on their petals in the glaring beams of dawning sunlight. Raising 
my face up to the sky, I feel the last cool raindrops hit my skin and send a 
prayer up to the spirits. 
I am wishing for the power to remain different, and to keep my ability to 
dream and to hope.
I am wishing to live.

I am alive.

- END (written in 2002; revised and translated Dec 2007)

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