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Challenge Ended
Things fall apart
"Sometimes, when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place." (Unknown) Prose, please.
Ended January 20, 2025 • 5 Entries • Created by dctezcan
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Things fall apart
"Sometimes, when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place." (Unknown) Prose, please.
Cover image for post The Darkest Nights, by MClarice
Profile avatar image for MClarice
MClarice

The Darkest Nights

I never thought I’d cry on a park bench. Not me. Not the one who always seemed to have it together, always knew the right thing to say. But here I am, staring at cracked pavement and rusted swings, and the tears just won’t stop.

The United States is not united. Were we ever? Maybe. Maybe there was a time we were fooled into thinking we were. Or maybe we just ignored the cracks, hoping they wouldn’t spread. But now it’s impossible not to see lines drawn so deep they’ve become trenches. Everyone on one side or the other, yelling across the divide like they’ve forgotten we’re standing on the same ground.

It’s exhausting, isn’t it? This endless noise. Everyone shouting their truths, everyone convinced they’re right, and no one really listening.

I can’t help but wonder when we got so lost, when we started looking at each other and seeing enemies instead of neighbors. When we stopped believing that love not anger, not fear, but love was the greatest thing we had to give.

I look around at the world, and it feels darker than it ever has. Like an eclipse is swallowing everything good and bright, leaving us in shadows we don’t know how to escape.

But maybe that’s the point of the dark. Maybe it forces us to see what we’ve been too scared to face. Forces us to stop pretending everything’s fine when it’s not. Forces us to look in the mirror.

I think about those mirrors. About the face staring back at me every morning, tired and worn, and how easy it is to avoid the questions I don’t want to answer. Have I done enough? Have I stood up for what’s right? Have I loved the way I should?

The answer is always no.

Because it’s hard to love, isn’t it? Real love. Not the kind in movies, but the messy kind. The kind that makes you forgive someone who hurt you. The kind that makes you see the worth in someone who doesn’t see it in themselves. The kind that makes you take a good, hard look at yourself and decide to be better.

“If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change.” Those words hit differently now. It’s easy to talk about change. It’s easy to say the world needs to be better. But doing something about it? That’s the part we’re all afraid of.

Because change isn’t comfortable. It’s painful. It’s messy. It’s looking at the people who scream at you across that divide and realizing they’re just as scared as you are. It’s realizing that the only way we climb out of this darkness is together, even when we don’t agree.

And it’s realizing that love...fragile, fleeting, precious love isn’t just a gift. It’s a responsibility. To see someone else’s soul and remind them of their worth. To let someone else see yours, even when you’re afraid they won’t like what they find.

I think about the little things: my neighbor who brings food to the single mom next door, even though they argue politics like it’s a sport; the librarian who stays late so every kid has a warm place to study; the man I saw on the news who carried strangers to safety during a flood. Heroes, all of them. And not a single one wears a cape.

The rain starts to fall, soft at first, then harder, until I’m soaked. I don’t move. I just let it fall, washing over me, carrying away all the fear, the frustration, the anger.

We’re falling apart. I know it. You can see it in the headlines, in the way people look away from each other on the street. But what if falling apart is the only way we can come together?

Maybe things have to break before we can see the pieces that still matter. Maybe we have to lose the light before we remember how to find it. Maybe the soul has to feel its worth, not in the easy times, but in the hard ones.

I stand, dripping, my hair clinging to my face, my breath sharp in the cold air. I don’t have answers. I don’t know how to fix this broken world.

But I know this: Love will always be the answer. Not hate. Not fear. Love. Even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard.

Because the darkest nights? They’re the ones where the stars shine brightest. And maybe, just maybe, we’re not falling apart. Maybe we’re falling into place.

Challenge
Things fall apart
"Sometimes, when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place." (Unknown) Prose, please.
Cover image for post Untitled, by Knox
Profile avatar image for Knox
Knox

_______________ A knock on my brain._____________________

_______________There once was___________________________

_________________a closed door.__________________________

__________________Now its open._________________________

____________________There is a box._______________________

_______________________A ribbon comes off,________________

_________________________once tied neatly in a bow,__________

__________________________________ and the lid is off._______

_______________________________There's bubble wrap,_______

_____________________________there's secrets.______________

__________________________The questions come.____________

_______________________I think and think._________________

_____________________I think of excuses. They ask,___________

________________________"was it really a joke?"______________

__________________________Of course not, I think, and,_______

____________________________"do they know?" More excuses,__

____________________________________"my mental health?"__

_______________________________and now the bubble wrap___

_____________________________it's unraveled,______________

________________________________and everything's...________

__________________________________falling apart.__________

Then,__________________________________________________

I realize,________________________________________________

I just need to be led to His path,_____________________________

I look back and see, and wow, it's already there, behind the secrets and worlds influence on me...___________________________________

Challenge
Things fall apart
"Sometimes, when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place." (Unknown) Prose, please.
Profile avatar image for 4N
4N

Fruit (Unknown)

I'm going to be the one, to remind

it's not about summers, destinations,

but the fall, where the seed, will have had,

before the after, that tender looking out,

and the future, a head seen as bearable, after all

Challenge
Things fall apart
"Sometimes, when things are falling apart, they may actually be falling into place." (Unknown) Prose, please.
Cover image for post The Fall, by DianaHForst
Profile avatar image for DianaHForst
DianaHForst

The Fall

I think I know when things are falling apart.

When the grounds falls under me and I fall.

Fall like the way that the black is coming,

but I don't know where the ground is underneath it.

I know there's going to be pain when I break my fall on it,

but I only wish I knew when time was going to stop feeling like it's crashing around me.

She's there. Somewhere above me.

I let go of her hand,

to spite her and in spite of myself.

My stupid, angry, idiotic self.

And I can see the pain and fear in her eyes.

She's screaming at me,

and it's like her voice is in my ears.

Shaking my head as if telling me to wake. The. Fuck. Up!

Rattling it until everything else around me is drowned out.

She hates me.

I don't think anything else in life has ever made my blood run cold,

but those words right there were the crushing moment when I collided with my 'ground.'

When I bottomed out before the heartache blossomed up out me,

and I think I might have screamed at myself somewhere in between to stop.

"Stop!"

"STOP!"

"STOP!"

But I fucking didn't. Why couldn't I fucking stop?

Why couldn't I shove my goddamn foot in my mouth before she ran out the door, and I suddenly started to wonder if she was coming back.

My kid asked me if she was going away for good.

"Not this time" is what I wanted to tell them. To tell myself, but inside, I was shaking. Terrified that she might not.

Holy- fuck. WHAT have I done?

My foot taps against the floor.

My head starts to split with an ache that I can't drown out anymore.

My eyes start to water until they itch and ache, and I'm sure they're pink but not from some fucking whiff of a special something that I used to take.

Ah shit. I've fucked up.

Oh god, I've really really fucked up.

---

I called her name.

No answer.

I put the kid to bed, and I walked around the house quietly.

Stupidly, I know. I know she left, but I'm still looking for her.

God, what have I done?

"I deserve this."

At least, that's what I keep telling myself as I push my palms into my eyes, trying to blot out the headache.

"I deserve this."

"I deserve this."

"I deser-"

"Please don't leave me." And my voice chokes out a sob into the space beyond me, where my words can't leave my aching head.

I love her. I love her so much, and I tore her heart apart with my hands and watched myself do it.

What kind of monster am I to chase my own love from my arms? From our house?

I'm a monster. An awful, terrible monster. And I can't forgive myself. I don't know if she'll forgive me, but in me aches the need to be. I'll beg for her to forgive me. I want to everything to bring her back, but she needs space.

Oh, what have I done to myself? To her?

I only wish it hadn't been sixteen years ago.

I never saw her come back.

At least, not to the same person. Not to the person who chased her out.

I hugged her close to me after she walked in the door.

When she let me.

I hugged her the very next night, so tight, I could have sobbed my eyes out for days.

I scared the shit out of myself, and maybe that's what I needed.

Maybe that's where I needed to land. On the fucking ground,

out of my stupid little 'head' nest of sovereignty.

Because what stupid idiot leads a country alone?

A dick-tator that's who.

And he is not who I am right now.

And so I hug her tighter.

Because she lets me.

I kiss her lighter,

because she's tender and weak.

I made her that way.

I can give her the power back I stripped away.

And for sixteen years on after that.

I give it back.

I give her back her strength.

I remind her how much she's done.

How she's so strong.

And I'll never take that away again.

I fear that if I ever were that monster again,

I might kick my ass, because no man alive will ever break her heart again.

Not me. Not any asshole. No stranger. Not even her father should he ever say anything against her.

I love her. Love her tenderly.

If I didn't love her, I'd be the death of me.

Of everything we are together, and everything I ever could be.

Because she'd have me fall.

Fall so far that I could realize what it felt like to hit the Earth.

To know the ground beneath me isn't going to break beneath me.

It'll catch me, in it's cold, hard, unloving embrace.

And I'll break apart on it, without being able to see her face.

I am 21 years or older.