Falling, I Shall Rise Again

They surrounded him.

Again.

It wasn’t the first time.

Their voices were loud and jeering. Snarls flew from their lips like arrows. He knew what they wanted. He wished he could just give it to them. His heart beat from within him. He wanted to give them what they wanted. He wanted to see them smile, and laugh. He wanted them to be happy with him once again.

Perhaps he could muster up enough strength just once more. They stood by waiting for him to connect their tubed needles to his veins. He could stick a half dozen needles in each jugular vein and a half dozen in each leg, and each arm. He loved doing that for them. It gave him a feeling of satisfaction knowing he could sustain them. They stood by pale, crying out to him, agonizing screams coming from deep within their shriveled bodies. They held their needles out with open hands begging for a little of his life to rejuvenate themselves.

He fell to the ground.

He had no more to give.

He’d been here before.

He’d always somehow found the strength to stand back up take their outstretched tubed needles and plunge them back into his scarred, retracted, tired veins, and drip out just enough thick red blood; which they lapped eagerly up with their tongues; as each precious drop slowly accumulated at the end of their long tubes, and dripped into their mouths.

His eyes crossed.

His body throbbed.

His heart convulsed within him.

His mind mustered him to stand. He raised a hand groping at the air, hoping it would be grabbed to help him stand once again so he could do what he was good at; giving every ounce of himself to others. His blurry vision came into focus. He felt as though he had raised his hand high up over his head; He had barely turned it to face his palm upwards. A half dozen of them with outstretched arms stood over him holding their needles out; their tubes sucked dry; and with every word they spoke, their saliva mixed with his blood, dripped from their mouths. They cared not that he lay on the ground weak, needing help. They saw and felt only their own needs.

“Help me.”

He whispered.

“I have no more to give.”

They shrieked and withdrew their needles in horror. “Help you?” They said in shock. He tried to focus his eyes on them. “Give a little to me please. For all I have done. Just a little water. I’m parched. Please.” His tongue, dry, stuck to the roof of his mouth as he struggled to speak. He squinted his dry eyes trying to focus on all those who surrounded him. Faces of those he loved. He would give anything, everything to them. Now, he was the one in need. This time, with nothing left within him to give.

“No! Give us a little first.

And we shall give to you after.

We too are parched.”

They continued to encircle him, crying out with pitiful bleak squeals. His ears strained to hear the raspy words coming from their shriveling hideous faces. He could see they were so weak. So pale. So thirsty.

They needed him.

He had to rise.

He must. Or they might die.

He could not bear to see them like this, pale, thirsty, weak. He could rise again and plunge their tubed needles into his veins and feed them, and oh how beautiful they would look with smiles upon their faces, gleefully draining him of his own life blood.

“Help me up.”

He said.

“And I shall give you all you need.”

“Stand on your own!” They shrieked. “You are strong. Stop acting so weak! We are weak. We have never been strong. We cannot help you up. We can barely stand ourselves.”

He knew they were right. He was the strong one. He was always the one to help them up and give of himself to them. He had only disconnected so he could go to replenish himself, yet he had no strength even for this now and they did not have strength enough to wait for him to replenish himself.

His resolve was deep. His strength waning, he turned his upright palm back to the ground to push himself back up to his knees once more.

“Hurry! Hurry!

We are weak!”

They screamed.

As he placed his palm flat on the floor and flexed his own withered arm to push himself off the floor, they grew excited.

“He rises!

He rises!

He rises to give us strength!”

“Yes! Yes! Yes! Rise! Rise! Rise!” Their chorus of chanting cheers brought joy to his heart. He pushed with his one hand off the ground with all his might, smiling at his own strength. He was strong. He could do this. He would be their strength when they were so weak. They were so helpless. They needed him. He would rise to the challenge once more. What would they do without him?

“Rise! Rise! Rise!”

They chanted.

Their hands outstretched.

He pushed with all his might. It took every mental fiber of his being to focus on the strenuous task. He breathed hard, his muscles had nothing left to give, yet he forced them to push beyond their capacity. Beads of sweat accumulated on his forehead. His hand, arm, and head shook uncontrollably. What little fluid was left in his own body accumulated in his rapidly beating heart.

“Me first!”

“No! Me!”

They snapped angrily at each other.

He arched his neck and back to lift himself to his knees. He let out what felt like a roar of power from his lungs, as mentally he forced his exhausted physical body into subjection; instead the slightest, weakest grunt fell from his quivering lips.

He gasped for air.

His eyes crossed

He fell back to the floor.

An agonizing pain shot through his body. His heart pounded within his chest. The muscles of his neck seized. His whole body quivered, then froze. He began to gag. His stomach and throat convulsed uncontrollably within him. What little strength was left in his body, his mind no longer could control. He fell to his side on his shoulder and his head dangled from his neck as if it was broken. He struggled to breathe. Acid shot up from his stomach, burning his throat, accumulating in his mouth.

“He fell! He fell!”

They shrieked.

“How shall we be sustained!?”

They looked back and forth at each in other in despair, then took a step closer to him. Two or three of them got down on their knees and moved toward his face. They looked at him as if he was some strange foreign creature; as if they were trying to understand why he was unable to rise to their aid. They peered coldly into his eyes and extended their tubed needles close to his face. “We need you to be strong. We need you to put these into your veins so we may feed. When we are strong, we will give you what you need. We promise!” “Yes!” Said another. “Just thrust it into your vein is all we ask!”

His mind tried to force words out of his mouth. The words ‘help me’ were lost in the acid vomit that filled his mouth, and came out sounding like a gurgle.

His heart throbbed in his chest.

He convulsed with extreme pain.

He gasped for air; and instead of air, his lungs flooded with his own acidic vomit.

His gagging increased. Tears filled his dry eyes. He couldn’t speak to request their assistance. He thought surely they would see he could not rise to help them, and they would aid him. The thought eased his mind and allowed him to deal with the ever increasing pain that convulsed through his weak body. Yet they did not come to his aid. His eyes pleaded for assistance. His hand groped for one of theirs.

“Bleh!!! He is worthless! He is weak! He can not help us! Ahhhhgggh!” They screamed and beat on their chests. “You worthless, no good weakling! If you cannot give to us, we want nothing more to do with you!!! Pthtt!” They spit on the ground! “Ahhhgggh! You worthless weakling a waste of our precious time!!!” One at a time they spat at him and skulked away in search of someone strong enough to feed them.

He lay there, choking on his own vomit, his mind blacking in and out, watching every last one of them stomp off angrily and in disgust of his weakness; as he struggled for air, his heart beating its last. After all he had done for them, not one of them reached out to help him; and now he lay writhing in pain, dying alone. A new pain arose within him. This one exuding from his very soul, far more painful than any physical pain he was experiencing in that moment.

Indescribable emotional pain flowed in waves over his writhing dying physical body. The feeling of rejection and a realization that they had never loved him as he had actually loved them for who they were; they only loved what he could give to them not for who he was to them. What he had thought was genuine love and happiness for him as a person, as they seemingly expressed, was just selfish usury. As he slipped out of this world, his last thought was, “Am I to die alone after all I’ve given to others? I’ve been used, not actually loved…”

I awoke from my dream.

I opened my eyes.

I knew it was time to rescue him — again.

I stretched, sat up in my bed, folded my legs, placed my hands on my knees palms up, closed my eyes, and entered a meditative state. I saw him, lifeless, lying there on the ground. I flowed energy from the universe through myself, into him, breathing life back into him.

His eyes opened. My brightness from flowing the pure energy of the universe into him, I could tell was blinding him. He squinted trying to focus on me. I wiped the bodily fluids and vomit from his mouth. I then flowed energy down his parched, weary throat, withdrawing all the vomit from his lungs. I gently wiped the acid away, and healed the deep burns the soft tissue of his inner lungs sustained.

I sat him up and leaned his back against my raised knee. I gently stroked his hair with one hand and hugged him with my other hand. I continued to flow the energy from the source of the universe through myself and into him. As he sat leaning up against my knee I could feel his heart begin to beat slowly again and his first breath — a sigh of relief. I felt an energy pulse instantaneously exude from his weary, worn body. It was a pulse of the deepest relief, from hope that lost, was now renewed. It was a pulse of overwhelming relief that he was not alone, and that he was loved.

He looked at me and weakly asked, “Who are you?”

I looked at him with greatest of love; the deepest of gentleness; and as I did a tear of understanding slipped from my eye.

“I am yourself on another plane of existence where love flows freely in the ether, so that all persons may bring healing energy into their being, and with ease flow it through themself to those who have need of it.” I smiled at him then continued. “I was given a vision that you were in great need, and I’ve come to give liberally to you; teach you how to access this energy and fill yourself, so you do not continue to expend all that you have within you, for those who are in just as much need as you are daily.”

“Thank-you.” He said weakly.

“Don’t thank me,” I said kindly. “Thank yourself. You are learning to come to your own aid by going within when you are in dire need. I am always here. I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

“Well that’s comforting.” He said as he closed his eyes.

I smiled and kissed the top of his head. His tense body relaxed and I just let him rest there on my knee refilling himself with the universal light energy that flowed freely through me.

-J.C. Miller

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