Regina Manyara
I am tired of walking. It has been more than two hours of walking, sandwiched between two walls extending up towards the sky and out straight ahead on the path in the most relentless manner. This being the first long path I have seen in the maze, I thought I made a good decision taking this turn. But after walking for five minutes, then watching those five turn to ten and then ten to fifteen, it was becoming clear that I was wrong about this turn. I have probably been wrong about the whole maze all along.
With the days I have spent wandering around, looking for a way out, I thought I have at least gained some basic knowledge about my captor, like the size for instance. Estimating and guesswork is by no means an accurate way to fully understand anything, but at the time it was the only real plan I had. I followed a path from one corner I had found to another, walking along what I guessed was the outer most wall. But this path has extended longer than that perimeter wall. With every step I take forward I seem to be turning my past discoveries to trivial pursuits.
The maze isn’t always a bad place to be. When the rays of the sun stretch down into every nook and cranny, the maze seems to be painted vibrant green, and on those days it occurs to me that solitude could be shaded with much duller colours. The life of the maze has provided fuel for my body and curiosity. Wandering around, I found plants shimmering like opals in the sun, iridescent and magical. Despite this, many of the plants have a very simple flavour, without any of the bitterness of uncooked greens but rather with a clean and bright tang. In other parts of the maze, small pools of water reflect dances of ripples on the maze walls under the warm sunlight. The walls are their own complexity. All across the maze run intricate carvings of lines and swirls which sometimes seem to glow ever so slightly in my peripheral, when the angle of the light is positioned just so. I have sometimes spent hours lying by these pools with my feet in the water welcoming the sun on my face without a single worry of trying to leave.
The same cannot be said for days when the sun is absent from the sky. The glow of the plants fades as they become sticky to touch and bitter to taste. Without the soft warmth of the sun, the air in the maze sits still and sends chills through my body. Waking up on a sunless day sends my thoughts to my first day in the maze when my passions ran high as I spent every fibre of my being looking to learn what was going on, was this a punishment, if so, what had I done wrong? But on those days when the sky looks dark and green, unsettled without the light, I have will to search for answers. Any knowledge sits heavy in my chest, nagging me with all the things I still cannot explain, what brought me here, what is going on, is this a punishment if so, what have I done wrong? On those days I lay on my back looking at the dark green clouds blanketing the sky in a smog and wish that any force of nature could compel it to travel down and crush me.
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The length of this path is beginning to feel like insanity. The monotony of it all is making it difficult to distract my mind, the perfect invitation for panic. In the past, walks though the maze often brought me to various turns, left and right, leading into various areas of vegetation and water. This has been the longest walk with no new discovery. But I am also partly responsible for the madness. I knew in the first hour that I could have turned back but I didn’t. Every hour passed was another opportunity for me to turn back and reassess, but here I still am. While the hope for an exit floated through me in the beginning, now a hard stubbornness has placed itself at the helm of my control, driving me further down this interminable path.
I look behind me to see the shimmering trail I have smeared along the wall. Once I found the iridescent plants, I began using them as markers on my walks, crushing them in my hand and smearing them in intervals along my way, marking my existence. Now the trail shimmers softly against the stretch of uninterrupted wall, marking my insanity.
Looking up I see the orange-red hues of sunset begin to tint the sky. It will be dark soon and I am nowhere near where I came from and have no clue how close I am to anything else. I finally decide to stop and beginning setting up camp. Nights in the maze are always difficult. There is an endless noise of nothing that sweeps across the maze as soon as the sun has completely set. The first night the silence pressed into my head with a cold intensity, bring tears to my eyes and settling fear into my heart. But I eventually found ways to cope with it. In the dark of the night the light of the walls glows brighter, and it is never too cold, but I learnt to build a fire every night, to keep the silence at bay. The crackle of the fire against the void was such a welcome relief I cried the first time I built one. Now I know it is the only way I can sleep peacefully.
I wake up the next morning to the warm sun on my eyelids. From ground level the path seems to stretch dramatically into the distance. A plan needs to be made. I can’t spend another full day here if it’s not with the goal of heading back the way I came. But that idea feels like taking a knife to my pride. To turn back and give up, to let this maze take me down yet again. I sigh as I get up from the ground and lean against the wall, the weight of the situation becoming clearer to me. I let my eyes settle on the carvings of the wall in front of me. Its grooves gently spiral up and down the wall, getting lost then reappearing from behind the vines and leaves which hung all over the maze.
Maybe I don’t need to turn back. The only thing behind me is the last place I was. I have no sentimentality, no nostalgia or responsibility which would drive me to turn back. Pushing the last bouts of sleep from my body, I unwrap a large leaf filled with an assortment of plants and flowers I had put together for breakfast. Since my first day in the maze, I have been tormented by a desire to leave and a frustration towards the unknown constantly looming around me. All the rippling pools and shimmering plants have never brought me closer to any answer about this place. But maybe I shouldn’t be looking for answers. Whether it is back where I came or here on this path I need to stop fighting the unknown. As I finish eating I feel a soft warmth gently hold my cheek, and something inside me feels settled. Snapping out of my thoughts I turn to see it is one of the leaves from the wall. A little chuckle escapes my lips as I get up, pack up my things and continue on down the path.
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