.
See,
You cannot kill your dreams.
They will wait and wait and still be waiting for you
When you die.
No illusions left to make you blind,
spent your days searching for your heart with your mind,
skirting around the surface of the well,
frozen over with fear and the lie
that there is nothing deeper here to find.
Nothing more to see than the confines of your own mind.
To be free?
Don’t be ridiculous.
The water below is full of monsters
and the ice protects you from rejection –
It deflects them, and reflects the world you already know.
Only the mad look at what lies below.
But here’s the thing…
The monsters are lonely too.
And eventually the heat of their torment will melt through
your shield of ice – they’ll close in on you, desperate
to be in communion, single mindedly seeking union –
the violence of separation erupting as the pressure valve releases
Into the ether of empty illusions.
….
There is only so long you can be in control,
only so long you can stay awake on patrol for your instincts
Are wiser than words,
Older than your cells.
They beat with the mycelial drums that hum the dead to forests
So that you may breathe.
So whether you pretend not to hear
the melting ice seethe,
or you smash the reflection with your fists,
or you melt it with the salt of longing to breathe;
The warm shadow waters will come to claim you.
They will come to unblame you, unshame you and untame you.
They will destroy everything that is not true.
And you will love
And you will love
And you will love.
.
.
.
Imogen Obserski – Spring, 2024