Dream # Two

The world was ending. Something cataclysmic had happened, and now it was too cold to grow the crops needed to support modern society. I had met a girl from real life (who I had and to some degree still have a rediculous crush on) and we were slowly starving/freezing to death. Finally, we realized that the only option for survival was to move south. We eventually reached a structure populated by a few hundered people, many of whom I recognized. Over the weeks, the girl and I were seperated as we assumed our new roles in this commune, until one day I decided that I desperately needed to ask the girl to marry me (my sleeping mind doesn't make very rational choices) under the assumption that we wouldn't be around much longer anyways. I went to the leader of the colony to find where she was living in the building (and here's where the dream becomes nightmare). He told me that she had hung herself several weeks ago, on April 4th. Apparently, she had learned that her parents died trying to reach the colony. I went to her room, and saw the rope hanging from the ceiling,. the most horrific part of the dream, however, was that I never actually saw her body, and as I woke up I was running frantically throughout the building attempting to find her, not sure if she was truly dead.

Perhaps the most strange aspect of this whole story is how I was woken up. It was a jehovah's witness saleswoman knocking on my door.

My dog has Cancer

When you approach from further away

she looks... swollen... overfed... pregnant

but then you start to notice the signs

the spine set apart from the body

the angle she holds her head,

it suggests resignation... defeat.

You come closer still and

she lays down on the tile

trying to keep her failing body cool

The tumors press hard against her lungs

and with each breath her ribs must stretch

far beyond their original design

They look almost like gills

And I fantasize that she has

become a fish ready to find water

but that's a silly thought.

You feel her frame and notice

how her cells are eating what food remains

trying to replenish the blood leaking from her spleen

those little nubs on her ankle

are little more then empty sacks now

a further reminder of how far she has fallen

she used to be so fast-

and now she can't even manage

to walk, at least without panting

when that happens, she looks happy.

She is five years old

and this cancer is as random

as the force that gave her life

that little mutation that killed her

no different then the ones that birthed her

a chaotic sequence of tragic events.