The Door

There is a door in the middle of the woods that pulses like a heart and whispers like a secret. Behind the door is a world we do not yet know, one that promises something better than what we have. Steady and alive, this is where quicksand melts to a soft pillow of land beneath tiny toes and rainbows shimmer like little diamonds, reflecting their colors on the faces of the children who always have a place there.

If dreams did not die in youth, this would be the hollow clearing where they unfurl themselves from old cocoons, where laughter serves as currency and it is plentiful; infinite. In the middle of the night, the sun shines. In the middle of the night, no tears are smeared across the small cheeks of those who have already seen too much.

There is a war outside the door and we are losing because there are children who drag their parents across the hardwood and drop their empty bottles into the trash and there are those with wide eyes who ask too many questions and find only bruises on their ribs as an answer and we cannot see the purpling beneath their shirts until they are already broken. Dreams settle inside the hearts of the young and lie unprotected, waiting to be scooped out from the inside.

If children are the future then we will soon know boundless ruin because the door in the clearing in the woods is only fantasy and wishing for better does less than feathers tossed against glass houses.

We are the ones who shatter.