There it is!

On the periphery,

in the ether,

pulsing gently in all the world’s liminal spaces –

 

The other world.

 

The dream world?

The world of death?

An alternate reality? Or Universe?

As yet, I am not quite so certain.

 

But it dances,

just on the outskirts of my field of vision,

taunting me with its promises.

 

When I was younger

I used to dream of a ship

set starkly against a night sky.

Looming, large and unsinkable.

A ship that could hold humanity.

 

I would enter at the bottom,

and yet,

travel slowly deeper still,

Down,

           down,

                        down.

Meandering,

lost and alone, 

but never afraid, 

along its countless corridors.

Searching, 

for I was never quite sure what, 

down the many floors

into the bowels of the ship.

 

I would open a door

and my grandfather would be there

laughing 

his jovial, deep-belly laugh,

standing in the doorway as if he had been waiting for me,

as if he knew that I would come knocking on the other side.

His plump frame lit from behind,

totally suffused with glowing light.

 

I would hug him,

hard,

for I instinctively knew it had been so long since I had seen him.

My cheeks would hurt from smiling,

my eyes slowly filling with unshed tears.

 

We would talk, 

of what I could never remember,

until he would suddenly stop and tell me that it was time to keep looking,

that my grandmother was also on the ship,

and that I had to go and find her.

 

I would suddenly feel as though ice was trickling through my veins,

and those unshed tears would begin to flow freely

down my cheeks

as I realized I had been dreaming.

 

“You are dead.”

I would moan.

“This is a dream.”

 

My grandfather would laugh again,

that same deep-belly laugh,

and I would throw my arms around him,

this time afraid to let go.

Not wanting to leave,

to wake up,

though he would continue to urge me 

to search the ship.

 

“Your grandmother is here too.

Your grandmother is here too.”

 

I would wake

and curse the confines of this mortal body,

this mortal mind.

Living to dream,

but only dreaming to wake? 

Until now, 

when it feels as though all my life I have been searching,

Corridor by corridor,

Floor by floor,

For that ship,

That beacon,

That other world.

 

“Your grandmother is here too.”