Where nightmares crawl

 

I speak in poetic wonder.

I write my lullaby dreams.

I sift through fairytales

and I sip on ethereal streams,

when I drift seamlessly across

the threshold of night

and let my eyes slip into that

vast field of delight.

 

I speak in songbird serenades.

I swiftly let them celebrate

the ending of the day,

as they roost in my head.

I slowly close my eyes

and I walk on fields

of cloud soft light.

And as I close my eyes

I feel alive.

 

For a second.

 

Then.

 

It happens.

 

The darkness descends

across everything.

The echoing sound of the end

looming in.

The booming drone of a piano

trilling on a key.

A wilting feeling takes over me.

and I’m pulled down.

 

Down.

 

Down.

 

Grabbing the slimy walls

that were my bed

as I am sucked

further down,

deeper into dread.

The endless chasm.

The endless fall

from which there is no climb.

 

Dreams flung against the wall

out of which nightmares crawl.

 

The monolithic bedside cabinet

looms high over me

and I’m at the bottom

of a well of misery.

The dripping of a million tears

echoing around the trilling key’s

discordant screams.

The clock in the sky melts

into a viscous mire

and time floods over me.

 

And I’m watching my own dreams

splashing against the floor

in worthless puddles

and I’m no longer sure

if my mind is aware

or if I’m even here,

or if here is real anymore.