The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Strongholds of Both the Blessed and the Damned
by Amanda Worthington

My family’s totem represents the death of flight

A hollow skull accented in the feathers of the still-alive

Probably plucked without consent and arranged

Like flowers at a tombstone

.

I resent my family

But I quite like the totem

Token of endurance that it is

And I wonder what kind of bird sacrificed its skull

For our conduit

And who built this testament to our claim on paradise

.

For there are worlds beyond our imagining, we’re told

Strongholds of both the blessed and the damned

Far-off lands forbidden to the living

And this strange monstrosity,

This is our doorway

To what we’ve earned from our time in this life

But it can only be opened from the other side

.

I was not endowed with my family’s pride

And understood by the age of ten that it could not lead anywhere good

Flying things have always been held sacred

And we’ve ridiculed the earth with our flightless bird of stone

Like there is somehow greater glory in staying low

Crawling insectile, ever servile

Always empty of ambition and dreams

.

I am not prepared when the eye sockets begin to glow

“IT’S OPENING!” I scream to no one and nothing

Though I think deep down I know that the portal will not close

Until we are all through

If there are any others left, they will be drawn by its siren’s call

And what will our legacy be?

.

My mother would tell me to go through on my belly if she were here

I walk through instead because she is dead and corpses are easy to ignore

I hold my head high like fear isn’t coursing lightning hot through my veins

.

Because flight is sacred

And if I can channel it into my stance

Well, when my new world comes into focus I might

Have a fighting chance

.

.

Fiction © Copyright Amanda Worthington.
Image courtesy of Pixabay