Saving your Dreams,

Will I be successful?

Will I be able to support others in my life for once? Will I ever have enough? Will I ever be enough?

I can’t help but feel like I’m shrinking this winter, like some shriveled mass of empty flesh so addled by apathy and anxiety, I’m drooling with glazed eyes, still laying in bed as if I was ill. My eyes are red, not because of “blue light”, but because I do not stop seeing projections played upon the screen of my mind. projections of failure, and despair, of loss and tragedy. Why young man, must you torture me? I have done nothing but live within you and dream of things so warm and bright. This creature in the mirror, keeps me behind his jaws trapped behind his fat throat. I can do nothing but smolder small embers in the light reflected by his eyes. I feel so cold, I feel as though I do not burn as I did.

I remember, being so hot I would leave singes on the hairs of others. I remember catching fire as I fought, and as I loved, and as I dreamed. How old am i? I do not feel like I had seen twenty-four summers, I feel much, much older.

I should not be weary, but I am.

I should not be cold, but I am.

I should not feel so alone, but I am.

Why can I not see? Why do I dream of only fear and violence?

And not of things I had used to? Of love, adventure, and accomplishment?

My heart does not stop breaking. Like an endless piece of glass, there will be a new crack by tomorrow, and the day after. It might look as though the world was frozen in the very moment countless lashes of lighting vein through the black skies. All reaching, stretching out, borrowing from this moment to the next, tearing at the world and unleashing chaotic fire upon the greens and the innocent living things.

My youth, where have you gone? Did I leave you behind somewhere?

Ferocity, I had known the sting of your bite and the heat of your breath for so long, but I had not seen you in some time. Am I no longer worthy? Am I so weak and cold now that you left me?

With you gone, Bitterness has caught onto me, and grown into such a nasty mass upon my flesh.

Please return to me, hope.

Please return to me, youth.

Please come back to us, resolve.

I am weak, I cannot see with smoldering embers, I cannot feel through my numb fingers.

My friends, have all left somewhere. I cannot see them; I cannot hear them. My dear friends, have you all crossed already? Who am I without all of you?

All I know is that you have been gone for some time now, and I have been here, wherever this is. In the dark. I was marching forth, in the beginning, but now, my torch has spent, and my boots have holes. The fire I made to camp for the night, has burned and now only embers glow in the cracks of the logs. I have been waiting for the day, but it has not come. My belly is swollen and thirsty for I have drunk my salty tears. It aches and yearns for warm grilled meat. My muscles feel withered, my body feels thin. Lips crack by the constant wind. I huddle near the last embers, wrapped in a thin cloak, shaking as the cold wind tickles my bones.

You will die here, do you accept?

A voice from somewhere, I close my eye to ignore it.

You will die here, do you accept?

I won’t die, someone’s out there looking for me, I think.

You will die,

Do you accept?

The voice was quiet, but my mind was so empty the words would echo.

Do you accept? Do you accept? Do you accept?

Moments play upon the stage of my mind, when the last ember is leeched of its warmth by the shadows.

Truths that had been told to me before, I had realized to be lies.

You will never become anything more. you will never find someone to love or have a family. You will never accomplish your dreams. Your friends are fools, and they will never truly love you. You have nothing to offer the world. You belong nowhere, and no one will accept you.

Do you accept?

My teeth clench so tightly, they chip and crack. My tears flood the creases of my leathered face. But alas, my heart could not break anymore. My tear ducts dried, and I finally had nothing inside. I was glass, broken but not stained.

I was, finally, nothing. I finally felt so much I could not feel again. It was strange. There was moment, I took the knife at my belt side, and dug the point of it to my throat. Seemed to be the next step, to complete being nothing. But I stopped. My life ran in reverse, and soon a memory had overcome me. Clenching my eyes closed, I saw myself somewhere familiar. It was tranquil place, with much sun, and tall grass around me, and the mountains in the distance. Clear blue skies. I hear my fathers voice behind me, I turn and see the old wooden church they had built for the village. He was fixing a few planks of wood that had rotten. He asked for my help, and I did. “Isn’t this place great? You can build anything here. Make whatever you want, I think.”

“The village in the middle of nowhere? Where its too hot, infested with rats and bugs, and the locals treat us differently?” I asked, in my usually smartass way, as I did when I was younger. “Ha! No,” he chuckled. “This whole world God made. He made it so big, so spacious, and filled with so many interesting things. You can make anything you want here, your free.”

Have I been keeping myself prisoner all this time? Had I forgotten what it was like to feel the sun, and see the stars? Have I forgotten how to live?

I have been so focused on my mission on my ambitions, that I had forgotten why I wanted to be so ambitious in the first place.

Have you forgotten little soul?

That you wanted to carve out your own piece of the world, and have beautiful things in it, and have all those people you love to dine with you at your table? Have you forgotten your dreams?

No, I have not forgotten.

You will die, do you accept?

I will die, but I do not accept to do so in the dark, as I was.

I acknowledge you, but I do not accept you, despair.

I remember the taste of a feast with friends,

I am warm with this will of mine,

With my friends and family, I will dine,

Around this table of mine,

In a world that I had changed,

In a house I had built,

With food I had cooked,

And the dream that I had saved.