Closing your eyes

War is raging in my country..
A fact that I still try to grasp ,analyze, understand!
Every thing I have ever known..
All the familiar places ,people ,cities. Everything feels so alien now..and ,I think, to many of my country men and women,,
It is war...
I close my eyes, try to see ,to understand it "objectively" as my friend always says,,,but I can't..
When I close my eyes ,what I see in the darkness is helplessness..
the inability to do anything that can make the difference..
I close my eyes ,I see those who were killed ..
I see the tired face of my mother..
The shocked face of my sister..
The anger in my brother eyes..
And I see faces from my life...
My friends..some of them will never come back..
I see the faces of those I cared about ,and respected, lost ,and confused ..
I squeeze my eye lids more..
More images run on that dark screen..twisted with agony...strained with fear...
Then I see flashbacks from my past.The life I chose to leave..You feel the bitterness all over again..You taste it...you smell it...you can almost ,ALMOST, touch it...You squeeze your eyelids even more ,this time to stop that hot drop from running down your face..
You sigh..
You try to focus again..
Every thing is so confused on that screen...You can't tell which part is your life ,and which is the life of others ..You just can't tell the difference..and You don't care..Because in war ,even if you were thousands of miles away ,you still feel that burn deep inside you...
You take deep breath..
You feel ashamed..
How could you think of yourself ,summon your own memories ,feel the personal pain ,while that ugly war is consuming your homeland ,threatening your loved ones??
Then the answer comes..
Because it is HOME..it is the place in which all these memories formed. It is the place where your life HAPPENED..
You open your eyes, you look out side the window ,at a different sky, different sun...You don't need the screen anymore...The faces ,the places, the memories..They are all in front of you now. So vivid ,so real ,so close ,yet so far...You reach out with your hand..It touches nothing but air...
You release that hot drop from its prison ,to find its way down the lines of your face..Your hand drops on your lap..
And you close your eyes again
And whisper: I am sorry...
.....
A.