Sheol

by Helena Draven
(W-S, NC)

finally

as the dream sifts out of the holes in my mind, i suffer with its passing

i do not grieve so much for the loss of the dream, but for the loss of the worthiness to dream it

i am ignorant

i will know

i have the walls ahead of me, high and far, i have my intentions in my back pocket

i feel the pain rise as a tide rise as a mountain, thrusting into the conscious as a surfacing whale in my mind

i am a disbeliever

i will grab faith

the screen glares in admonition, my heartbeat scorns my desperate efforts to not be

living onward, existing, striving, a torturous winding path of knowledge straightens beneath my feet

i am benign

i shall cease to be static

calmly setting bare feet to the coals, i walk, slowly, enduring, rejoicing in the scalding pain of realization

dreaming different dreams, new fantasy and fatality mingled with traces of nothing, traces of the past

i am flawed

i am willing