Prompt #1: Death Too, Must Be Earned

Life is hard. Grit in your teeth and sand on your skin, the burn of the sun across the breadth of your shoulder. Hauling in product day in and day out, from sun up to sun down. Each trek of the stars across the sky not the hope of a new opportunity but the dread of the next insurmountable goal. The cost of life is high and the toll is great.

Who comes when the child cries? Alone in the bassinet with no cares. The innocence of childhood already streaked with the red of sin, the soot of a hard life yet to come. She cries and screams, tangled in cast off, sitting in shit. Wiggling and writhing in anger and fear. The child came into this world with war in gear.

Black as a coal shaft, dirt on her face, restless and worthless, mud in her place. The work is not kind, not gentle, or easy; but it puts food on the table even when wheezy. There’s an empty spot at the table, an empty plate before a chair, nothing to share. Nickle and dime, penny and ounce, the track of a life covered in soot and hard put.

A man, she found willing and able, to put aside his pride to work harder than ever. A life worth more than grit and bare bones. They’re aiming for sunshine and gold on their picks. A dream shared, made weighty and special, for the depth of love wrapped thrice around the wrist, ties them together like steel with twists.

A child to come, lost bloody and pale, stolen in the night beyond the pale. Nearer and nearer, the thorny vine wrapped their hearts. Cold and callous in the malicious sight of the sun.

Life is hard. Grit in your teeth and sand on your skin, the burn of the sun across the breadth of your shoulder. Hauling in product day in and day out, from sun up to sun down. Each trek of the stars across the sky not the hope of a new opportunity but the dread of the next insurmountable goal. The cost of life is high and the toll is great.

She grits her teeth and sets her spine. Life’s toll is great, but death too, is earned.