Empty Skies

He looked up shielding his eyes from the harsh sunlight.

They say the sun gives life, light and dispels darkness and gloom. But it was the clouds he seeked, one drop on his parched land.

What they did not know was that too much light can take away hope.

What did they know about gloom, they who spoke from their artificially lit homes. Their words were as artificial as their sun.

This sun was burning down all that he had sown. It had been doing that for a few years now as if mocking him for having faith. The light was in the sky but going out of his life.

Burdened by the loans taken over the years, pledging even his children as lifelong labourers he had nothing more to give.

He swung the rope onto the tree branch thinking at least it would hold till the end. He had no faith in anything. Everything had failed him and the strength of the rope was his last hope to escape the claws of the poverty, abuse, failure.

He could bear the emptiness in his stomach but the silence in his hut was deafening.

The children were too weak and feeble from being starved too long to even cry. They would sob sometimes in their sleep as if in response to the gnawing in their bellies.

They would miss him but what did he have to give to them. If he could give them one grain of food one less tear he would be worth something.

His wife said he was their sun. Just like the burning scorching sun he had burnt their lives to cinders albeit failing to provide any warmth in the dark freezing nights where the chill penetrated the bones through straw walls.

It was the time for the sun to set. They would grope for him in the darkness of their own lives.

Would their dawn ever come??

Empty Skies

Written in response to Daily Prompts: Empty