The Secret Desert – Daily Prompt

Secrets are a desert. The more you have, the more barren the wasteland is. You’d think they’d be a forest, deep and dark and hidden. But no, secrets are a desert. Lies are a forest. Dense and dank and murky. They grow with a life of their own and if you are not careful, you will lose yourself in them.

The thing about forests though, is that they’re cool and shady. So when your life is a desert, it’s so very tempting to grow yourself a forest. What are a few lies if you can get away from the scorching blaze of your secrets? Before you know it, you’ve surrounded yourself with lies, trapped yourself so deeply within the forest, you can’t even see the sun anymore.

But lies – they lie. For although you can’t see the sun anymore, though you no longer have its light to guide you, the desert is still there. Still as barren and endless and full of secrets. The sun still burns and you can feel its heat. The canopy of your forest amplifying it, containing it like a greenhouse. Suffocating. Demanding. And you can’t even see the light.

The truth is a river. It flows with life and strength. But it’s deep and terrifying, full of rapids and pieces of driftwood that crash into you. You can’t just rest on its edges, you can’t dip your feet in a little. You have to plunge right in. Because you see, on the edges of truth, is where lies are the strongest. A forest growing strong, fed by the river.

Secrets are a desert. Lies are a forest. The truth is a river. How do you survive?