Culmination of a Dream (into the light of day)
Work in Progress
19 January 2024
Animal J. Smith
Scared to sleep, dreams are jagged, sometimes I wake yelling,
Thrashing around, trapped again – what’s this about?
PTSD lingers, with remnants of nightmares.
Most horrors in life we will handle mundane:
A loved one with cancer, a brother with AIDS,
A sister-in-law who might drown in despair,
An early spring deluge has flooded the basement –
We take one impossible task at a time,
We tend to our sick, we bear up our loved ones,
I put on my waders. God’s grace will suffice.
but once your eyes are shattered and your retinas etched with images unthinkable (until they weren’t),
when you have seen heard smelled tasted what is beyond human capacity to even hint at,
after your mind has been forcibly expanded beyond what had ever been thought possible, and it dawns on you that you were face to face with wordlessly deep obsidian evil ,
and now you’re a member of the club no one ever seeks to join,
we who through history have borne witness to the unspeakable,
our shadowed fellowship, our dark treasure, ours alone,
not spoken of one with another – our language secret, silent,
a thousand-yard stare, a salute, and then gone – our connection
constant and unbreakable. We know where we fit
in the hierarchy of victimization, the tree of degrees of loss,
and our treasure we jealously guard. In the future,
when interested parties with pickax and shovel
sift through our remains looking for artifacts
they shall find nothing: we’re taking it with us,
All our dark knowledge of that day leaves the world when we die.
Sorry, historians: from us you get nothing.
No one will ever again be burdened with what we have been fated and doomed to carry,
the images unspeakable, the wormwood stench,
the hole in the fabric of daily reality, all will be gone when we die,
this is ours, ours alone, ours forever, mine in my heart forever,
my dark treasure...
It’s all I have left of what I loved.
___
And so we fix what was broken that day. Let it pass from this world.
We could not prevent it, we did not see it coming, we were powerless to stop it,
but this much we can control, we can set right,
we pack out the ashes and leave only light behind...
Only our love will remain.
___
All these years fighting, all the surviving,
All the lost time, did it make any difference?
Well, there's glory there too, Animal. Look at you,
Jumping for treats, shiny coat, tail wagging -
After all, I’m no arsonist. I’m just a dog.
When life’s on all fours, every day is a treat!
___
Christo, my muse, to whose height I aspire,
Is said to have said at the end of his life,
“You must embrace your full life, even the years when you were silent.”
“They are still yours, you were still an artist.”
“It is your whole life in art, and you must embrace that.”
Where’s my Goddamn flute?
They’re waiting, Animal. Step up to the mic. Big breath.
Tongue finds the hole in the head joint. Bear down...
Goddamn it, I’m home - it’s about fucking time.
Animal is going to reappear. Completely.
Thrashing around, trapped again – what’s this about?
PTSD lingers, with remnants of nightmares.
Most horrors in life we will handle mundane:
A loved one with cancer, a brother with AIDS,
A sister-in-law who might drown in despair,
An early spring deluge has flooded the basement –
We take one impossible task at a time,
We tend to our sick, we bear up our loved ones,
I put on my waders. God’s grace will suffice.
but once your eyes are shattered and your retinas etched with images unthinkable (until they weren’t),
when you have seen heard smelled tasted what is beyond human capacity to even hint at,
after your mind has been forcibly expanded beyond what had ever been thought possible, and it dawns on you that you were face to face with wordlessly deep obsidian evil ,
and now you’re a member of the club no one ever seeks to join,
we who through history have borne witness to the unspeakable,
our shadowed fellowship, our dark treasure, ours alone,
not spoken of one with another – our language secret, silent,
a thousand-yard stare, a salute, and then gone – our connection
constant and unbreakable. We know where we fit
in the hierarchy of victimization, the tree of degrees of loss,
and our treasure we jealously guard. In the future,
when interested parties with pickax and shovel
sift through our remains looking for artifacts
they shall find nothing: we’re taking it with us,
All our dark knowledge of that day leaves the world when we die.
Sorry, historians: from us you get nothing.
No one will ever again be burdened with what we have been fated and doomed to carry,
the images unspeakable, the wormwood stench,
the hole in the fabric of daily reality, all will be gone when we die,
this is ours, ours alone, ours forever, mine in my heart forever,
my dark treasure...
It’s all I have left of what I loved.
___
And so we fix what was broken that day. Let it pass from this world.
We could not prevent it, we did not see it coming, we were powerless to stop it,
but this much we can control, we can set right,
we pack out the ashes and leave only light behind...
Only our love will remain.
___
All these years fighting, all the surviving,
All the lost time, did it make any difference?
Well, there's glory there too, Animal. Look at you,
Jumping for treats, shiny coat, tail wagging -
After all, I’m no arsonist. I’m just a dog.
When life’s on all fours, every day is a treat!
___
Christo, my muse, to whose height I aspire,
Is said to have said at the end of his life,
“You must embrace your full life, even the years when you were silent.”
“They are still yours, you were still an artist.”
“It is your whole life in art, and you must embrace that.”
Where’s my Goddamn flute?
They’re waiting, Animal. Step up to the mic. Big breath.
Tongue finds the hole in the head joint. Bear down...
Goddamn it, I’m home - it’s about fucking time.
Animal is going to reappear. Completely.