@TSA (Sisyphus Needs His Boulder) In front of me are many boulders, pushed by the young and the old alike. They trod forward through the burning heat and the rank propagation that blisters the senses. The air shimmers, and in the distance, where people vanish, twice as many take their place. A child faints, her doll-like body crushed by the burdens of those surrounding her. A few foolish souls run forward, escaping into the masses ahead. If they had not been caught, and torn apart by boulders and the Furies, with their bloody scraps thrown back to the mountain’s base, then I too may have run. Maybe then, they would be brave, not foolish. But they are dead. So they are foolish. My boulder crushes my foot. Do I still hope? The dilemma — if it can be called that, the heat allowing for no true consideration — is suddenly not mine to bear. My boulder rolls down the hill as I stare in shock; past the Furies, horror; off of the mountain, resignation; into the abyss, relief. Can they see? Can they see I have no boulder? Can they see I am free to walk? Can they see I am free to leave? I look, but the masses have no eyes. They stretch their broken faces towards the summit, hidden behind clouds, a summit they do not know exists. Did I have eyes before I lost my boulder? I am paralyzed with indecision. Escape, behind me, visible and immediate; Salvation, in front of me, uncertain and arduous. I scream until the blood pools in my lungs, I wreck my broken and battered body against the ground, I weep for a life of pain and meaning. The blood stings my eyes. I break the child’s lifeless fingers from the boulder she has failed to let go of. I follow the same path I had stepped upon earlier, one bloody footprint at a time.