Rupture

Donna Clovis


She longs for someone to save her. She holds the crucifix close to her heart. Prays salvation. A hope. She bows her head. Shades her face in darkness from the sun. Veil cover. She crouches on knees in a corner. Concrete buildings surround her in shatter. Sharp, crooked craters stir senses with delusions. Obliterates the boundaries. An apocalypse. For she is the only resurrected one. Once lost in the depth of darkness through the night. Spit out of hell.

Nothing is recognizable. Rubble. She is a woman waiting patience poor of fractured faith. She bears the cross in her hands. Begins a frenzied search for the foundation. The basis to believe. There is emptiness in nothing. But she believes the emptiness as sacred space. A silence between musical notes. She rests a religion.

She does not lift her eyes. She cannot. Her bowed head holds her down. Staring. Biting parched lip until it bleeds. She mumbles a verse from the Bible. Quiet chatter phrases. Then meditates. She rocks from side to side. Hums golden stanzas. A hymn. She cries. Then shouts obscenity. A rupture.

For the first time she hears a heavy voice like that of a man. But thunderous like God. She raises her eyes heavenward Hope wanders. Wonders perfect the blue sky above her crushed soul on Earth. She looks to the clouds to capture an angel. A savior. Someone to deliver her into red, ravenous rapture away from rubble.

But there are no chariots. There are no angels or a configuration of saint. No white horses. No rescue.

She hears the voice again. It is a siren song. Louder. She does not understand the garble of words. The speaking of tongues. She looks around from side to side. Still on bended knee, she does not move in metamorphosed landscape. The broken bricks of stale, stone stench. She sighs.

She hears the voice a third time. A trinity of thought. Her head swerves swift. The voice is closer. Towers over in a brash boom. A palette print of sonorous sound. Chorus-like praises. God has come for her. She looks up for a transformation into spirit.

A wrinkled outstretched hand casts large shadow above her crouched body. Her eyes barely attempt to look into his eyes. Rock of ages. She shouts to the Ancient of Days. And he reaches for her hand. She extends it into the air. Open wide. Searches the wind. Tenderly touches his fingertips. Then grasps his whole hand.

She does not understand his words or the colors of the uniform brown and gray. They are foreign phrases. But soft and kind. He lifts her from the desolate space. Hotel room in an unfamiliar country, where land mass of earthquake collided the night before. It leaves her with nothing. Belongings bashed buried to the ground.

But she is rescued. Saved. He carries her to the ambulance waiting. A resurrection living. The ascension back to life.