Deeper Than Dreaming

The waters re-appear

Drowning imagination in salty froth

As the world strangles his neck, he felt his teeth fall,

Below the abyss of the waking world— like notes from the past

Images left on the canvas

“Don’t paint them again!”

 

I wander now on the boat made of rubber tires

Using broken hands to steer

The stiffness points north

“I have no intentions of going on journeys anymore.

Let’s dream to wander aimlessly.”

 

Inner eyes seeing through the body

But there are no landmarks or memories to possess

 

Everything I was once

 

Gone

Left only with the finding of himself

 

With fluidity, he soothes his urges,

But now the tempest has risen again

Nostrils contracting with the heavy scent of turpentine

Knowing the power over him is held by the blueness of the past

 

But the crippled sailors’ journey is meaningless

At the same time, the boat is only directed by an easterly breeze;

Reflected by Narcissus

 

Lip-syncing Queen of wands I found in that forgotten deck

I don’t fear the tides

Like towers crashing down

 

But even at the edge of this precipice, I can’t escape my body

Frozen by guilt and sheltered by the warmth of regrets

 

 

I am the only thing that survived the end of the world

Now the sea-serpent emerges from within

He rises                                   Spiraling like minarets

 

It was the snake that eats itself eternally

It hissed so he could bow his head

 

It proceeded to cannibalize itself

As the sailor continued on

 

 

There was still no sign of land

But the air had eroded a smile on his face.

 

© A.R Minhas 2018