Religion as my only option

By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. This wasn't the first time this has happened. But this time I was scared. I was terrified. I never saw something quite like it; The smoke was everywhere and I couldn't see much, breathing was as hard as seeing and suddenly I felt like laughing. A thunderous laughter came out of my mouth and I choked on ash. Still I kept coughing and laughing because God! I will die. This is it, this is my last day here. And I'm spending it like this, suffocating on air. I have never felt anything that resembled this, except when she left me, or when those boys in the school yard hit me so hard I felt like my insides were on fire. Love maybe felt like this, or hate, I still get those two confused. I stepped into the front yard and walked straight to the tree that was dying. I don't know why but I felt sorry for it. So glorious and gigantesque just to die and become part of the ground that it so graciously stand on top of. It was truly heartbroken and ironic and so goddamn ridiculous that I couldn't stop myself from screaming like a madman. We are so insignificant and I hate it. Religion is our way of surviving in a lonely world desperate for something other that what we are sure exists. This tree and in consequence this house that I have lived in for most of my life were burning down to become ash and dust and myself with them. My life flashed through my eyes and I saw every time I said yes when I wanted to say no, every time I laughed when a joke wasn't funny, every time I helped people who needed it, I saw every tear, every thank you, every tip I gave to a waiter who was taking care of their child all by themselves. And I closed my eyes so tightly that I started seeing green and red and yellow stars, because I hadn't lived a life worth remembering, and worse, I haven't lived a life worth getting into heaven for. There was a flower still not touched by the fire, it was pink and red and I thought that it was the most alive thing I've ever seen, even though I've seen children being born, crying through the happiness of the mother, maybe crying because of it. I've seen people laugh and cry and break down but I have never seen such a fragile and beautiful thing in the contrast of destruction. Of damnation. There was something about that flower that gave me all the answers and at the same time left me hollow. There was something about that fire that gave me every memory that I've ever tried to push away to the very back of my mind wrapped in silk and bows. I couldn't be dying. I just couldn't bare the idea of not existing anymore, even though I've wished for it many times before. I have never not wanted to live, but I always wanted to die. They seem like the same thing, but one is a wish, and I won't tell you which one. The fire was coming closer and I started to get warm for, maybe, the first time of my life. It was like being hugged with love and hate and every emotion that a human being can feel. But I was condemned. Condemned to remember, to feel sorrow and to eventually become dust. A conviction made for me the day I was born, when god decided that I was not worth loving. I took the flower in my hands and tore it in a million pieces. I have always been more myself when I broke things that were beautiful. I have always been more myself when I stood, waiting for the fire to burn me. Autumn came with a warning, a cry for help. But I didn't listen, because I never did. I never cared. Even then, with the fire so close to me, I wasn't sure I did. I was condemned, I knew it the day that my pencil broke in half when I was learning to write, and when my mom came home from work with a bruise on her arm. I have always been broken, but at that moment, I was divine. I was waiting to become ash, to be a part of the universe that I resented for so long. That flower, that tree, the fire and me, we were the same thing, we were all condemned, as all beautiful things are. Beauty without tragedy never existed. Fire that isn't created by god is created by humans. I was meant to burn, I was meant to break, I was meant to love the things that hurt me. I fell on my knees, brought my hands together and started singing the song we used to sing in church, the one that talks about god being almighty and us being products of his will and power. I have never not wanted to live. The last leave fell from the tree, my singing became weak. Religion was for desperate people. I was alone, but I've never felt more alive. It was like all the people in the world lived inside me, like I had been all of them, through time. It was like life stabbed me in the chest, like I finally felt holy. Love is not, like many people say, a drug. It is venom, but the best kind. Life was not meant for me, but death wasn't my decision. Life was not meant for me, but death wasn't my only purpose. I had broken things and I have loved them too. I have smiled through my tears and cried through my smile. God is holy and in consequence I am too. By the time I stepped outside, the leaves were on fire. My heart sank into my chest and I said "god if you are listening, please, hold me".