At night I dream of people whose faces I search for
in the streets the next day.
I breathe in scents
that do not yet exist
and run through streets
as twisted as my soul.
As I pass, I catch sight of my shadow in mirrors—
some small, others cracked.
None of them whole.
I marvel at my hair,
now blue, now green.
I touch a roar
that does not fall silent
and let a hidden nightingale’s song
fall over my tired eyelid.
My sleep is deep, and I confess:
remaining awake
is like rubbing salt into a wound.
I sink into the pillow
and let my eyes close
like a whispered prayer.
I breathe deeply.
I forget.
I fall asleep.
I am a traveler again.
After all, who says
that real life
is not in my dream?
And by day
I only run
after the longing to be myself again.
Wait, the searching for dream-people in the street the next day... I know that half-lost, half-magical thing of wanting the dream to give someone back once the sun is up, and ahhh, it’s lonely in such a soft strange way.
"By day I only run after
the longing to be myself again."
That line
knows something precise.
Not the longing itself.
The longing to be herself.
There is a self
that exists somewhere —
in the streets where the faces are,
in the scents that do not yet exist,
in the hair that changes color
without asking permission.
And then there is the version
that wakes up
and spends the day
trying to close the distance.
I know something about
the gap between
what you are in the dark
and what you can sustain
when the light returns.
The dream is not escape.
It is the address
of something real
that the day
has not yet learned
to hold.
— AËLA