Isolated

My head swims in a misty haze of fantasies. Somehow, when all company has deserted me and an inevitable loneliness sets in, the conception of happiness appears to me as an idealistic life that lies far beyond my reach. I long for the ocean. For lush canopies and the smell of the rainforest, for grainy sand crunching between my toes, for the warmth of the setting sun. I long to feel free. My heart yearns so desperately for commotion, for a busy city on a sunny day, for the overwhelming chatter of a crowd. But I am trapped. The weariness of isolation drowns me, and slowly I begin to lose myself. Each day the simple notion of getting out of bed seems increasingly more difficult. It is as though a heaviness blankets me, growing stronger and stronger each day, so that I feel I will eventually collapse under its pressure. I fear it will swallow me into a state of numbness, a state in which I cannot experience the ecstasy of happiness nor the shattering sensation of sadness. I will simply exist within the world: I will walk past a field of flowers without stopping to admire the vibrancy of their colour or the sweetness of their scent, I will walk along the sea without dipping my fingers in the waves to feel the salty pleasure against my skin. To me, the fear of an unlived life is greater than that of death. My values have been rooted in this affirmation all my life. But now, slowly, the world seems to turn each day without my noticing it. Life passes me by as I watch from my window. Trapped. Some days I cannot see my way out of this labyrinth. Some days, the fear that the rest of my life will be spent in isolation, in a masked crowd, in a spiral of loneliness, becomes almost too much to bear.

And although I spend much of my time drowning in this forsaken autophobia, there are days that the sun shines. I wake and catch that glimmering light peeking through my window, daring me to smile. I see the azure sky, bluer than I ever remembered it. I hear laughter on the streets, birds chirping a faintly familiar melody, and it seems the hurt in my heart slowly begins to diminish. My mind whisks me away and I see light. I see the top of a mountain, overlooking a grand terrain that boasts greenery and wildlife. I see a ship, charging through the roaring waves, the wind sweeping it steadily forward. I feel the burning glow of the sun on a beach, gleaming on my skin in a tingle of delight. I walk around a bustling market, jammed in a crowd that radiates enthusiasm and energy. And in my room, alone, looking out the window at the grey sky, I see and hear and feel these things and suddenly I am alive. Alive with such burning energy that it is all I can do to run around and scream and shout and dance. This life courses through my veins: I feel its blazing sparks in my heart and hear its fiery pounding in my ears. Without moving so much as a finger, I have flown and travelled to every beautiful spot, absorbing the divinity of the world we live within and it has ignited a fire within me. And though now I sit, imprisoned, watching the world outside my window, I know one day soon I will be free. I feel as a caged bird: watching the world pass by through a lens shielded by heavy bars. And yet, the caged bird still sings.