I envision a world of darkness as I stare into my dreams,
taking me over as I breathe slowly in and out,
my chest rising as the fog coats the windows
of my small room.
The curious sound of scratching attracts my attention
as I notice a pale hand sitting on the edge of the window frame.
Its veins protrude from its coarse skin,
the pulse of its heartbeat thrumming
from beneath the blood-soaked lines in its fingers.
I try to cry out, but my breath comes up short,
as the cold of the night air binds me
to the thin sheets that wrap around me
like an inescapable web.
The hand stretches further into the window sill,
its thick yellowing nails digging deep into the old wood
as it cracks and splinters.
Its breath coats my skin as it moves closer,
staring through blue eyes blazing with joy
as a smile curves up on its crooked lips.
Black chipped teeth rot under bleeding gums,
open wounds, and pain coating my face as I stare,
the terror gripping me, pulling me deeper
and deeper into this abyss.
As it moves beside me, I can finally see
its twisted features in the tiny slivers of moonlight
passing through the window;
my eyes go wide as I know the smile
that now looks so familiar;
the eyes look like a mirror image of my own,
yet weighed down by years of abuse.
The monster I have created now looms so close;
it takes me over with every chemical breath,
every dark laugh as this misty shroud of smoke
begins to surround me,
taking me ever closer to the edge of life,
to the edge of the dream I am forever chasing
but can never seem to grasp.

I can feel it moving
like cold water sliding gently over my skin,
like a breath filled with crystal shards
breathing on my neck
as I sit staring in the endless void above me.
The slip of stone that shifts so softly from my face,
the heat falling like stars around me
as the pale rush fills me again,
coating everything that I thought I felt,
but I can't reach it,
can't raise these hands that were once so strong,
so human.
My heart beats,
the thumb of blood rushing through my veins
is the only thing that reminds me I'm here,
I'm something beyond a memory.
I move through the world, one empty step at a time
trying desperately to fill this shell,
to find all of those pieces
that have peeled away as the years went by.
The mirror stares back at me,
showing me brief reflections of something
that can't be me,
it can't be what I remembered I used to look like,
like what I used to feel like,
the smile that I once used to find so hopeful.
It was shed away with everything
that made me something worth saving,
something worth that brief touch of humanity
that has left me,
that filled these dreams,
filled them until they turned into the nightmares that I live with,
the ones that only seem to stretch
into never ending visions of my past
that I can never relive,
and a future that looks so dark.
I can feel where hope used to be,
where fear used to be,
where a human used to be
before this ghost consumed me
and brought to the darkness,
the sharp edge of life slowly tracing around me,
and leaving me lost, cold and alone
until the world has decided it's done
and rest becomes something I can no longer control.

Constricted, the suffocation burning in my throat
as I gasp for breath in the darkness that surrounds me.
Tiny slivers of light peer through the doorway,
announcing the presence of the world to my fading eyes
shrouded amid a flash of anxiety.
I can feel the pulse of my heart
beating in uneven waves as I crawl slowly,
the air feeling thinner as I move
toward the end of this darkening hole.
No more memories, no more dreams
flow through my mind,
just the constant pounding of dread
that conjures up scenarios
of never seeing the sunlight again,
never feeling the warmth of summer on my skin,
the sound of a sweet song,
just the defining silence
thought of fading away
as I lie in darkness.