The pain was intense,

meant that I dropped the plate

that I was carrying

and it split into three large

china fragments

and small dust pieces,

like the first split in the land mass

of Pangea, never again fitting.

I screamed but no one was there

in the virtual world

and nobody cared in mine,

silence after the final shattering

realisation that I am on my own,

as we all are

when we break the china plate.

Ian D. Hall 2016