Is it really the wind?

 

Do you seriously believe that's it?
Yes, I hear the whistle of it blowing past my ears;
Throwing back my hair from my face.
I see it moving the trees, their branches violently tossing back and forth.
I sense their struggle, holding tight, refusing to let go.
But is it really the wind?
Is the invisible force just a swiftly moving chilled air?
Maybe there's more.
Maybe it's alive;
Alive with spirit, restless, angered, and revenge seeking.
They're the ones screaming in your ear from their painful suffering,
Telling you their stories.
Times they've failed, times they've been led astray, times they've been abandoned, these things of the past that torture them deepest.
Maybe it's them who knock on your window.
They move the branches; they pull them, push them, with taps, clicks, slaps, and chilling screeches as they slide against the glass.
Trying everything to find their way in to slither across the floor and hide in corners, beneath furniture, behind doors, and under your bed.
They won't jump out at you or cast shadows on the walls or possess you in your sleep.
Instead they hide behind thick silence.
They dim the lights and make the world darker.
They release tension in the air creating nervousness.
You feel shivers down your back as they scan you head to toe.
Have you ever felt like you were being watched,
Like there was something or someone there you couldn't see?
Have you ever been too afraid to turn your back on a dark room,
And you jump into your bed from a distance in case something might grab you and pull you under?
They are more then the wind.
They're the nightmares; the darkest horrors come to life, the things you run from to save your soul.
They are fear.
Do these demons, living in the wind, live in other forces of the earth?
Do they live in the gray shadows, the rumbling storm clouds above, the ragging waters, the pitch blackness of night, or even the vicious pull of gravity?
What if these demons, dreaded and deadly, lived somewhere you'd least expect it?
A place you would never guess and you wish not to.
What if they lived in you?
Their stories are your stories, their sorrow and fear are yours, so are the burdens that haunt and control them.
They follow you everywhere.
Corrupting your dreams, changing your own thoughts, moving your hands and feet to places you don't want to go.
As you walk down the street, they grab at your ankles, climb up your back, and pull you to the places where you've failed.
They want to remind you.
They want to tear you down again.
And what if you could see other people's demons?
The things that bring them down, break them, destroy them from the inside out?
Would you look at them different?
After all, the demons live in all of us.
Control us and use us.
But they aren't just there; you create them.
You make your spirits with stories of torture and pain.
You can leave them to the shadows, to the dark, to anything around you where you can cast them.
Sometimes you hold them inside, thinking you'll forget and they'll go away.
They will never go away.
But who knows.
It's probably just the wind.