Darkness in Beauty
By.London
The sun is rising upon a small globally unknown village in the autonomous region of China known as Tibet. The morning breeze is calm and the sky is filled with a beautiful array of reds and oranges. On a morning such as today, the highest elevated country on the planet could be mistaken for some kind of poetical dream world. The village is surrounded by a fortress of mountains and is nestled tightly on the edge of the most breathtaking of cliffs. On a morning such as today, one would not be surprised to witness some kind of mystical creature blending in with the scenery as if sent from some other world. But this unknown village is another world. Modern terms would classify it as a third world. Its ancient ancestors from long ago would have preferred it to stay as what it once was: A free and forgotten world.
A sleeping boy is abruptly waken from his slumber upon his bedroom floor. His two brothers and three sisters are still sound asleep in the same bedroom as he arises to help prepare for the day with his mother. He is the oldest of the six siblings but still just shy of 16 in age. His father was taken away by the Chinese government recently for standing up against their extreme oppressive measures. They wanted 80% of the villages food surplus to help feed the Chinese army, but what this evil government did not realize was that one cannot demand possessions of what is not there to be taken. The village has been starving for nearly six months.
After preparing nothing but the amount of rice sufficient to feed one full grown man, the boy wakes his brothers and sisters so that they can eat their share of the food. While awakening the youngsters he finds that his middle sister of the three cannot physically arise and eat with the others. She is too weak and malnourished to stand, so he has to bring the rice to her. He feeds her one spoonful after another, but her system refused the food and she herself cannot find the energy to chew. He knows that his sister's time on this planet is limited and accepts that she will have another chance for a plentiful existence when she is brought back to the earth. He only wishes that she will be compensates with a life in a more humane world than the one in which they struggle today.
The boy and his oldest brother must now leave to try to earn enough food to keep their hunger stricken family alive while their mother takes care of the others. They work seven days a week in a fenced off factory located in the closest village to theirs. It is an hour walk from their so called home which is really no bigger than a modern day suburban garage. Although they produce soles for modern day American running shoes, they have no shoes of their own and are forced to hike to work in their bare feet over shale and gravel exposed to the blistering early morning sun. All of this, plus a 10 hour work day, for no more than a handful of rice each.
As the sun sets upon this village, beauty is all that can be seen. The mountain tops are being illuminated by almost a heavenly light and the villagers gather at what looks to be some sort of religious assembly. A small child is being buried as her mother weeps openly. A religious figure chants words of their own foreign tongue to the small group of onlookers. The girl died of starvation while two of her brothers were slaving for food. The boys returned home with no more than two handfuls of rice, only to find their sister's lifeless body lying in the arms of their mother. The two boys will fall asleep tonight dreaming of nothing more then a meal.
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