city

the news was like a bombshell ripping through the heart of a city.

it had exactly the same effect on me just like it would to the people devastated by such a tragedy. first there is disorientation, panic and fear. and then there is anger and helplessness. the overwhelming need for comfort and sympathy comes next. and then the rationalizations in an attempt to ease the pain that comes as the shock slowly wears off...

but what's unusual is that the news that came was not something that was unexpected. at the back of my mind i knew it had to come sooner or later. it is, after all, in line with the natural course of how things go. the surprise was that i grossly underestimated how it would affect me when it did happen. it seems that the defenses that i have painstakingly put up in preparation for that particular event were uselessly blasted into smithereens.

i do not know but perhaps it was because i was waiting for a miracle to happen; those sort off miracles that people expect for the most desperate of cases.

because in the final days, my hopes were buoyed by signs of a miracle, and each sign i treated with ecstatic reverence. each sign reinforced the hope and that fierce desire that things will turn out well in the end. i banked on the signs, i allowed myself to hope in such a way that they both fed into each other causing me to feel hope where there was none, to see signs of a miracle where there was just the last dying gasps for air.

to know hope is a wonderful thing. but for one's hope to be bashed is something that might be too much for someone to bear. yet the worst is when you know that you were the one responsible for setting your hopes too high up. out of desperation and despair.

i still need to recover, yet again, what is left of that city that was blown to bits. and as i pass by the wreckage that was left behind, looking for any that might be still of some use, i kept on thinking why i allowed myself to hope...

"Oh, by the way, i saw him last Sunday at this fast food joint round 4 a.m."
"Uh... was he with someone?"
"Yeah. It was just the two of them..."

and then suddenly it dawned to me. i know the reason why i hoped for a miracle. i knew, as it shone through a lie i forced myself to believe all this time; a lie i myself made as a means to forget.

now i know the reason behind this tragedy. now i know why a bomb was dropped in the city.