She drifted slowly to sleep,
opening her eyes for only the slightest moments,
trying to keep herself awake,
commanding her eyes to cease their throbbing…
but they wouldn’t listen,
she had no authority…
no longer was she molten…
like a volcano;
so she slipped
cold, lifeless, barren—
like Iceland,
but still she dreamed
and ran
through the crackling,
pine cone infested forest
that was once her flower bedded, wanderlusted imagination—
she was not looking for a place to stop, or breathe, or think—
she didn’t have the time to worry about such things anymore;
she was being chased
by the very fears that keep the smallest and largest of humans
awake at night:
the ones you can never truly capture with words,
the ones you must feel to understand—
those that you cannot relieve yourself of,
they are forever etched into your very being, they are you,
you are them…
your perception darkens,
you let it in, and
embrace it for all that it is…
you are reborn…
all you have done in life
and will do
becomes a fragment,
unfinished,
ongoing,
expectant—