1 The Miserable Man

A trail of footprints mark the snow. The sky is devoid of either clouds and stars, and only the moon lies overhead. A walking silhouette seems to be looking down at its feet, its hands in its coat pockets, and its breath crystallizing into a puff of white smoke.

'I don't know what's going on with me, ' the person paused. His eyebrows furrowed, as if sinking into deep thought.

As the man's mind wondered, he laid his sight upon the moon, and decided to sit on the snow-frosted ground.

"Why am I here?" He whispered to himself, "What is the World's purpose for sending me to this world?"

He looked at the ground and inhaled a sharp breath. His eyes were misty, but his tears refused to fall, and he blinked, as if to force his sobs back into his throat, his tears back into his eyes.

"I tried, so hard, to see why everyone is working so hard for such a miserable life; I pursued what everyone pursued, wished for what others had wished for me, did what everyone has been doing, did what everyone had told me what I should be doing. 'It'll get better, ' they said. It did not. I have only come to hate myself in the long run, and I have lost sight of what I had once longed for myself, " he muttered calmly. But his eyes held every grieviance he wished to pour out, things that mere words cannot release from the inner workings of his mind, things that even he does not know about, and things he had kept inside himself for so long.

He angrily rubbed his face. He pulled at his hair, muttered profanities, huddled his knees, sang jingle bells, and punched his chest. He pinched his thighs, clenched his fists, slapped his face. He screamed, he shouted, he clawed at his arms, and curled into a ball.

Nothing worked.

He still hated himself, and he still hated the world.

So, he cried.