Death on the Ganges
They reached to the sky, the sea of mourners, the clear crystal silence of the night now shattered by their symphonic wailing. They writhed with timeless misery, beating their breasts, pulling their hair, their faces washed with grief. Their eyes were as red as those gazing back at me from my mirror of despair. He was so young. He was so very young.

The beauty of the river became perverse to those who knew him. It was now frightful to those who loved him. The river that gave life now consumed it, lapping at the shrouded body that succumbed to its waters - so young - weighed upon the woven raft like flesh and blood turned to stone. The Ganges yawned and breathed him in. He was lost to them, and tears fell for every moment to be endured without him.

Candles floated upon the rippling surface, following the course of the gentle current, lighting up the path to eternal darkness. Farewell, young one. Each flame was a kiss goodnight.

Each flame was a burning truth. A truth that burned me. A vanquished soul that thrived on my remorse. And in those brief moments I suffered the oppression of all the remorse I had denied myself, bearing the whole on my shoulders and falling beneath its weight. He was so young.

Reckless thief. From his perch upon the garden wall he had spied the artefact glistening through the glass of my window. From his perch upon the garden wall he had clasped his hand as though the treasure already rested in his palm. I awoke to the sound of his heart, lurching with satisfaction, that this gift, fashioned by his ancestors and stolen by the hand of an Englishman would be restored to a child of its creators. This emblem of his past would end the suffering that had fashioned a sinner from the child he had been not so long ago.

I caught his bloodied wrist as it burst through my window, his broken fingers flailing. He begged for his life, but it was already claimed. By the time I drew him through the glass and to my body, he knew, and his sweet surrender begged tears from my cold, unyielding eyes. And still, I could not give them.

Sinners soothe the conscience, but young blood is sweeter, and there are nights when the man you think you know is far too tired and far too old to fight a war that is virtually lost.

And now the sea of mourners parted as I walked amongst them, bearing a sadness from which their humble souls were mercifully immune. Never had I felt such raw emotion. Never had I felt such anguish at having extinguished a young life. A life so very young.

I wanted to linger till the sun rose over the Ganges. I wanted to witness his rebirth with my own eyes. I wanted hope. But in my heart I have always known that hope is a fool’s fancy.

Morning comes and darkness reigns until it’s time to begin again.