Why Do We Forget Death?

See

In seconds the pallid world that I had come to love disappeared, swallowed by the inky blackness that secretly lurked under the sheet of white. Who knew a land so pure, so clean, could nurture such an infamous horror? Even now, as I calmly watch the endless light dim above, I don’t understand. How can such a dark being exist beneath the purist thoughts? How can it strike so fiercely, so quickly, after waiting through the immortal waves of time? These questions fall with me, as I plummet past the ancient beast’s jaws; as I leave one unfamiliar world to plunge into the next.

My first few steps into this frigid world were small and hesitant. This surprised me, I was so eager to start this final journey of inner exploration that I knew I would leap into the ordered wilderness. Yet, my excitement was smothered by the endless expanse of crystal white, the imposing view of a chaste existence unreachable by humanity’s ravenous grasp; an untamed order. A space cleaved from the rest of the Earth by the eternity of the sky and the purity of the white sea. The Arctic.

Smell

I had always wanted to fly. I suppose that child-like dream never abandoned me. The thrill of soaring through the air and piercing the sky has not left my wildest fantasies. Why not fly now? I grasp the blind emptiness and fashion myself a pair of shining wings. One flap and I am gliding through the artificial air, two and I am rising out of the shadows to greet the light. But, there is no third stroke. Out of the darkness, shady hands grab hold of my form, ruthlessly tearing the feathers of my imagination. Fingers of brine force themselves into my nose and mouth, burning away what little I had left of my senses. Broken in both spirit and soul, I am pulled back into the ebony crevice of the Earth, fated to continue a lost life in a maze of shadow.

During the first night, a stranger visited my tent, someone who was a foreigner to both the new world of white and to the old land I had left behind. The man was a master of eluding the senses, for I did not see nor hear his approach. In fact, he was already feasting upon my supplies before I realized that I was not alone. Inside my tent, the scent of unfamiliarity was carried by the wind, as if nature was warning me of some danger that did not fit. The smell was of something out of place, something from the corrupted world I had discarded. When I re-entered the white land outside my tent, I fell into a mist of imported stench. The scent had overpowered the chilling purity of the icy sea, replacing the clean crystallized air with the odor of previous life and extrinsic invasion.

Taste

Trapped in my own isolation, I continue to slowly fall into the lonely depths of total darkness. I sink into the black nothingness, the realm where sight is exiled and thought is forbidden, where all senses are numb. Here, light is a thing of myth for no such luxury has ever existed in the depths of the biting sea. The only entity here is darkness.

The intruder to my camp was larger than I expected, a beast wearing a thick coat of matted, white fur. I stood at the entrance of my tent, intrigued by this visitor, for I thought I was the only immigrant in this land. I started to leave my tent and greet this unusual stranger, but I was halted by a thunderous roar. The stranger had found my food. With massive claws that did not belong in my utopia, he tore fabric, containers, and bags apart. I watched, in dismay, as it ate weeks of my trip with surprising speed. Energy I would never be able to reclaim, flavors I would never have the pleasure of experience, were gone, devoured by the insatiable hunger before me. My mind thrashed in frustration for I could not stop such a creature. In despair, I returned to my tent, and while the polar bear held a feast outside, I tasted nothing but bitter disappointment.

Hear

The blackness pours into my eyes, fills my ears, and surges into my mouth; killing off whatever sense I have left. The glide of the emptiness around me and the cold sting of the shadows are lost to a thunderous thudding in my chest. My heart flutters wildly and the chaotic sound pulses through my veins. I am not gone. The darkness may have stifled all the senses outside of me, but I have internal light. Even if it is dimming.

The blue fabric of my life lay in tatters; shredded remains of the bags were scattered about the ice. A few colorful pieces were carried away by the whistling wind, only to be betrayed and left to die further down the ice. It seemed that misfortune had followed me from the world I had been trying to leave behind. I had to call help, I had to leave this harsh paradise, there was nothing left for me here. Tears froze against the pink of my cheeks as I searched for the red bag that would hold the satellite phone. I caught a glimpse of crimson against a field of white a few yards away. As I walked over to the bright bag, my mind played the shuttering of helicopter blades against the air, the sound of my failure. I was hopeless; this dream world of the deepest purity and contrast had been pushed out of reach. My years of preparing amounted to nothing but more loss. This expedition, like all my dreams, had been shattered. Releasing a shudder of more despair than cold, I reached out for the red pack. It was then I heard it, the warning that came too late. CRACK!

Touch

My light is dying, slipping away with every passing click of humanity’s internal clock. Each flicker of the unseen stars somewhere above marks a darker shade of the glow inside of me. For a second, the light grows brighter, as if making one last attempt at life, giving everything for one last push against senseless order. Then, the darkness floods in, smothering the radiance with blankets of salty ink. Death closes its cruel jaws around the scrap of life I have become and the world is thrown into echoing blindness.

Fear took hold of me; its trembling fingers dug into my spine and forced my eyes wide. I was standing on a patch of thin ice, a barrier so weak that I could see the blackness of the sea, barely contained, beneath me. If I moved back, just one or two steps, I would be out of danger, free to perish in this frozen land some other way. Yet, I did not step backwards, for before me lay the red bag of life. Just a few more inches and I would feel the rough fabric of the bag, the smooth buttons of the phone, and the warmth of a helicopter back to the failure where I belonged. I never did.