Cycle

Again. I wake up again. Cradled in my mother’s bosom, I wake up again. The world is spinning around me. I am born. I am new. I awake, in yet another world, another mother. I failed again. I failed, I failed in dying. I failed in ceasing to exist. I wake up again. This is a disaster, an eternal curse. Over and over again. Perpetual, it torments me. A perennial cycle. I can never be free.

Who am I? Do I even exist? Am I fucking real? It’s hard to tell. It’s hard to discern what is right from what is wrong. Because right now, as a baby, incapable of surviving without my new mother’s chest, her milk, her warmth and her voice, I am nothing. I am nothing, but this isn’t a new feeling. I have felt this feeling, this helpless sensation, this feeling of downright despair and failure, more than dozens of dozen times. It isn’t anything new. I am born but for the millionth time. I want to die, more than anything. Once and for all, that is. Waking up again in a new mother’s bosom? No thank you. But here I am again, with a new name bestowed upon my lowly self. A new identity to live in for the millionth time in a completely new, yet mundane environment. This is fucking horrendous.

I remember my previous death. In fact, I remember all the deaths I have experienced. I have been decapitated, lacerated, burnt, bled to death, even had the privilege to die of old age a handful of times. But in the end, I never defeated death. But more importantly, I have never defeated birth. Fucking birth. It is the start of a new cycle, a long, tedious, tenacious cycle, never letting me free of its monstrous clasp, never giving me a chance to decide my fate at least once in all my lifetimes. Birth is horrible. It eats away at my soul, turning it black, ripping it into smithereens so that when I am born again I will be but a shell without a decent human soul abiding within. An incomplete human being; nothing but a ghost dwelling within a hollow mask.

My mother—her name is Helen this time—cooes at me, those sickly sweet voices drowning me in all sweetness I do not deserve. She brushes my cheek; I can still see the glistening drops of briny tears hanging on her eyelashes. The tenderness turns my stomach. She loves me. I can tell. But do I deserve such unconditional love? I doubt it. Because I am me, a worthless piece of trash, someone who is gifted with the misfortune to recall every lifetime before the one I am living at the moment. Abnormal, yes. A freak, yes. I remember everything. Every last bit. But once I begin to tell someone, I become a total freak, a creep, a crazy-minded lunatic. Which I am.

Stop fucking touching me. Stop fucking crying. Stop saying you love me, for fuck’s sake. I am not worthy enough to receive this kind of love. I can remember all the bad I had done in my past lives. I have stolen, I have hurt, I have defiled, I have killed. I have fallen at the feet of God. Many a times. Too many to count, because the sins I have committed are too many to possibly count. Too horrible, that’s what I am. A horrible, disgusting, worthless piece of trash, because everything that composes me reeks of death and decay. No one should come near me for they deserve better.

The sun is in my face. Are my eyes blue this time? Or brown? Maybe grey? Or purple? Who knows? I can be albino this time. But whatever my eye color may be, Helen is peering straight into my pupils, confessing her infinite love for me, confessing that I am worth all the troubles she had gone through in her lifetime of twenty six years. My mind is everywhere. Haywire. I hate this disgusting piece of a man, or a baby, maybe. I hate myself with all I have, even my inability to truly end my life, but my baby self is crying out with all my might, reciprocating the love I feel toward this woman who claims to love me and wants to cherish me under her wings forever. I cry and cry, letting my voice out in the most boisterous way. I can’t deny it. It is simply impossible. I need her love, her care, her milk, her fucking presence. For survival. For me to be human. Though this may be my millionth life, my most primal instincts order me to crave for the will to survive and carry on. Even if the innermost core of my heart desires death beyond all else.

Oh, no. Her husband approaches. He hears my never-ending cries. The look in his eyes-how distasteful! The pure love engraved in his pupils-how preposterous! The husband puts his arms around Helen. What is his name this time? Robert? Jerry? No, it is Steven. Steven Holland. Steven Holland trembles as his arms reach out for my fragile form. He lifts me from his wife and cradles me in his arms. He rocks me back and forth, shushing me as my cries die down as the rhythmic motion lulls me to sleep. Drowsiness overcomes me. I don’t want this numb sensation to wash over my brain but it creeps into the links between my neurons anyhow. I try with all my heart to defy the drowsiness seeping in my mind but the irresistible fatigue pressures me to silence my mouth and let the lids close above the glassy eyeballs misty from crying too much. Helen and Steven sing lullabies to me. They are fucking terrible at singing, I muse to myself. Better find better singers to work for them.

Don’t let me slip into another peaceful slumber, I beg. To whom, though? To Helen? To Steven? To God? Who am I kidding? No one can hear me, no one can listen to my troubled sighs. Only I can hear myself because everyone else can only hear my babyish whining and whimpering as I fall into a deep slumber. Fucking stop. Stop. Don’t let me be. Don’t let me fall into an endless pit of oblivion. Stop, please, for the love of God. I can’t take this anymore. I can’t take this warmth I feel all around me. I can’t take this comfort surrounding me. I can’t take the sense of home. I can’t take the endless cycle of feeling home, feeling deserted, feeling empty, feeling revived, feeling renewed, feeling happy, feeling depressed, feeling nothing, feeling whole, feeling human. Feeling loved. When I wake up again, I will remember nothing. I will recall nothing until the moment I take my last breath. It is an everlasting curse. Let it all stop. Please. I don’t want this. Let me die, let me see heaven or hell, wherever the fuck I belong. Let me end this all. I don’t…I don’t…I don’t want to live again. I don’t want to fall asleep……..I don’t want to start over….help me…fucking hell, let me die…

Helen takes me in her bosom again, Steven leans in and wipes away his tear. They truly love each other. They are in love. They love their relationship, their marriage, the rings they share on their hands, the bond they have established between their families. And they love me. I am their child. I am their blood. I am their creation, I am their gift. Too bad. They don’t deserve any of this.

I close my eyes in defeat. Scattered words fill my brain. Life, love, protection, home, and care. Fragments of my past lives scratch the insides of my skull and leave permanent scars there. New scars, because countless have already been left inside. The sweet little lies, or maybe truths, serve to pierce my heart rather than close up the cuts inside because I know that they aren’t new. They may be genuine but I have already experienced them millions of times. And they don’t make me a better person. Fuck them all.

Helen sings. I hate to admit I am already drifting off to sleep, yet I am. This…this nonsense, it’s all nonsense. Soon the lullaby morphs into the thumping of my heart. Or is it Helen’s? Maybe it’s both, because I only hear one unified thumping and it’s soothing more than ever. My breaths even, my muscles slacken. The sane part of my brain refuses to function. I am a newborn child.

“Sweet dreams, Arthur,” a melodious voice echoes.

“My beautiful child,” someone whispers.

I lose my consciousness. I love mother and father. I slip into another wondrous dream. Papa and Mama await, grabbing my hands in theirs as we skip along to the harmonious melody hanging in the air and we march off into the blue mountain standing tall before us. I love my family. They are everything to me. And I will love them until the moment I die and every existing thing crumbles to dust before my ending days. They are my world, my melody, my love, and everything. I am nothing without them. I would never have been born without them. This is the beginning of my first life.

All I feel is love.