I watch
as they crumble
some only for a moment,
a flash of the inner turmoil
a glimpse, a blink, and it's gone
others, like staring into an open wound
a gaping hole,
still throbbing, still pulsing
bleeding, slowly

I sit
head in hands
trapped in the cycle of disbelief
and fooling myself into relief
I feel the passive observer
unable to act, or speak, or move
just sit

I stare
the panels above my head
offer a temporary distraction
this time, it wasn't just a dream
yet it feels more like that
than ever before

the Reality
rolls under my door
and drifts through my window panes
like a noxious fog
curling in wisps along the blue tiled floor
defying thermodynamics,
cold rises, heat sinks
seeping into my pores
filling my lungs, running through my veins.
I Know.

yet I still imagine,
fantasize, dramatize
a cruel joke, a terrible mistake
a diagnosis totally amiss

the phone Rings
a tremor of relief begins to quake inside of me
soon to be dashed
by the words transmitted across that line

I run
outside into the morning sun
the greenery astounds and amazes
the thirst of the Earth,
quenched at last

as a child I always looked up to the sky
to the clouds
as the End, the finality
high above, unreachable, untouchable
and yet, here I am,
Earthbound, temporal,
running through the gentle misting drops
of a cloud