Usually, we edit ourselves in our every day lives. We edit what we say and what we do. Being a writer, I am taught to edit my work, but at times, I don't edit anything. I sit and write and write, and then I read it back. There might be grammatical errors, or simply confusing sentences, but it's my writing, "in the raw". And that's fine too. I was looking through my folders and I found one I had written a few months back about the Holocaust...I took a Holocaust literature class and the first book I read "All But My Life" by Gerda Weissmann, really touched me. I've never cried so hard or so long. Her life is truly an inspiration. Anyways, if you're interested in the Holocaust, you should definitely check out that book.
Back to my writing, here it is......in the raw....
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I couldn’t go to sleep that night. Images I had witnessed of the dead and dying lay embedded in my mind. Their eyes looking back at me, looking for answers I could not give them. I knew nothing. I could say nothing. I wanted to get away just as much as they did. I wanted to run. Run away until my legs couldn’t stand it any longer. I wanted to live far away from the screams, the pain, the anger, the blood; politics. All of it was making me sick. But I stayed composed. I smiled and made my rounds. I tried to bury the fury within me. I dug out a deep grave inside me and buried it. I moved from bed to bed, hearing nothing but painful cries and moans, sometimes a few words, never of comfort. They craved my attention. My eyes darted from one to the next. It was never ending. The rows went on and on. I stopped suddenly, as I was feeling light headed. I was the one that needed comfort. I was offering nothing but blank stares and nods without comprehension; false promises around every corner. The dying wanted peace. They went with God.
Nothing but walking skeletons with empty looks in their eyes. The life was sucked out of them. In a way, they were already dead. Every step made in agony. Everyone looked the same. Who was responsible? Who would want the blood of so many on their hands? Why? Someone so beautiful, milky white skin, deep blue eyes, a pure blue, like the ocean. Her brown hair down to her shoulders danced in the wind. How could someone so beautiful turn into someone I could barely recognize? Her eyes had turned the color of dark ash. Her eyes looked empty, lost. She was just a shell. Her hair, gone, and her shaved head showed a hint of the brilliant brown hair she once had. There was nothing left of her. She was a walking skeleton with no willingness to live. Why had this been done to us? Why? What had we ever done wrong?
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