I found a writing prompt a while back that set the theme of flow. It could be used in any genre, no rules other than the idea of flow/ing be present in the piece somehow. And I thought it might be interesting to record “dark” to go along with the text. Here’s my take on flow:

I don’t know how long I’ve been falling in the dark. Or even what I’m falling through. I’m not falling fast. So much time has gone by that it almost feels like I’m not falling at all. It’s more like floating in the dark; a dark that never ends and makes you forget who you were. 

Sometimes I hear a whoosh, like someone is falling past me or maybe I’m falling past them. The only way I know that anything is moving at all: the way a whoosh sounds distant and slow at first and then becomes faster until suddenly it’s gone.

I’m not sure how I started to fall or where the light went. Sometimes I think if I reach out I’ll be able to feel a ledge to grab onto to stop me from falling. Other times I think that if I put my hands out, all I’ll do is hurt them by trying to grab onto something that’s moving too fast. And then I’ll just be falling in the dark without hands to break my fall when I finally land.

I know I haven’t always been falling in the dark, floating and flowing through time and distance without any way to measure either. I know I had goals and dreams and people I loved, but it’s all fuzzy now. I can’t quite remember what I wanted for myself or what I was doing to put myself where I wanted to be. Somehow my dreams for my life turned into a nightmare of ambiguity that I can’t escape. I’ve been falling for so long. There must be so much more to fall through. More time in the dark to try to remember my life than I will ever need.

I wonder what’s going on with the rest of the people in the world. Are they all here with me, wondering what happened to their own lives, endlessly falling through the same darkness that I’m in? Is their darkness different? Are they reaching for the walls as they flow by? Like water flowing through a pipe trying to stop itself.

If I could just remember who I am and what I chose, I could be sure to not make the same mistake again. Instead of falling through the dark like I’m blindly flowing down a river, I could choose my direction. I could choose firm ground. 

Maybe my time in the dark won’t end until I remember who I am and why I’m falling. Maybe once I remember, I’ll start to see a distant glimmer. Maybe, if I can remember my intention, the goals I set for myself, the dark won’t keep me from seeing. But how does one remember who they are when they are lost in the darkness?