her hands are bloodied and unclean as the end draws ever nearer

In those days, she danced through the meadows chasing butterflies and searching for rainbows. There was little the world couldn’t offer her, little that couldn’t be found. Now, the rain streaks down her windows, refracting bloody sunlight. The stars don’t seem so welcoming anymore, not when their silver light glistens through her tears.
They tell her to march to the end with boldness and bravery, head held high, chest forward. But as her reality tips and crumbles, her bones rattle beneath her sweaty skin, and her thighs quake until she collapses into the dirt.