DID I GO THROUGH THE TUNNEL?, Marco Cesare Lobascio [new reading .TXT] 📗

DID I GO THROUGH THE TUNNEL?

by

Marco Cesare Lobascio


Blackness

Silence

Stillness

No gravity

As in outer space

As in a Limbo

Without past or future

And no present either.


I “Wake up”

In the midst of huge waves

Freezing white water rapids

Carry me downstream

Submerge me

And bring me back to the surface.


My lungs are full of water

I cannot breath

I do not understand what is going on

What I’m doing here

What the hell

I am supposed to do.


A big wave lands me

Incredibly gently

On top of a huge rock

Right in the middle of the river.


I stand on my fours

And start coughing out

The water in my lungs

Until I can barely breath again.


Way down the rapids

I see my kayak

Getting smashed against rocks

And I start to understand…


The first outing of the season

Our boats in the river

The first few rapids

The “Slide”

The “Drunken Man”

The “Slalom”

Then the treacherous one:

The “Eye”.


Lots of freezing water from the glaciers

The directions have changed

My companions say

“First to the right”

“Then all the way to the left”.


I turned too early to the left

And found myself in a sort of channel

With a terrifying end:

Two large fallen trees

Obstruct the waterway completely.


I try to get out of my boat

While I am getting sucked beneath the trees

And I disappear underwater…


That’s the moment I died.


No more adventures

No more music

No more friends

No more making love

No more of anything.


I did not feel ready for that

But there it was happening

And I blacked out.


The Kayak obstructed so much

The water flow

That the boat and I

Were “Exploded” to the other side.


I sat on the rock in the middle of the river

Waved to my friends coming to the rescue

And I realized I had just been given

A generous “Second Chance”.


A few minutes earlier

I was twenty years young.


But I was twenty years old

When I left that rock.

Publication Date: 08-13-2009

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