The old and wise of us say, no one truly dies until the last time their name is said. In that way, no great tragic tale is truly tragic. Romeo and Juliet, Achilles, Helen of Troy, those names are still whispered and lectured and agonized over. Those people are not dead.

This dark cellar has no name. Neither does the one locked inside. She's been there long enough for her eyes to burn from the light of the moon, acting Plato's allegory of the cave on far too real a stage. 

The workers cut her chains, but they freed weakened feet, unable, undesiring to walk. They pulled her from the cellar cage, but a frog in a well doesn't believe in a small, round sky. Her mind is dark cement walls and the hum of human voices from a place she can't imagine. 

I thought of the great tragedies. Of how even Julius Ceasar, stabbed over 20 times, was still alive. I thought of how the workers asked neighbors and supposed 'family'. No one knew her name.

I wondered how long she'd been dead.

I wondered if she'd ever been alive to begin with.

(189 words)