The Long Sleep

It's always a long way home

when your head is in the clouds

and your feet can't find purchase on the ground

/////////////////////////

You close your eyes at the end of the day

trying and trying so hard to sleep

but need to hear what your dreams have to say

/////////////////////////

They tell me about my past

They tell me about my present

Will the future be told if I ask?

//////////////////////////

Escape, running, no way out for me

Impossible roads which fall off cliffs

and tumble me carelessly into the sea

///////////////////////////

Flying with broken wings

waiting to crash to the earth

With nothing to hold me up but my feelings

//////////////////////////

In my dreams I am strong

full of superpowers of magnificent strength

Owning towering wisdom, I am never wrong

///////////////////////////

I must step carefully through the snakes

jump over crocodiles, avoiding the lions

hiding behind trees, whatever it takes

////////////////////////////

I'm at the bus station trying to get home

Not enough money, I search for change

Try calling for help with the same broken phone

////////////////////////////

It has been decades, why haven't they repaired this?

I wonder as I pick up the same damaged receiver

over and over again, hoping it's been magically fixed.

////////////////////////////

Then, somehow I am hanging onto the bus roof

Struggling to hang on as the bus hits air

I see my old street for a moment, then poof!

////////////////////////////

The bus lands and deposits me far away

in a strange neighborhood in the dark

Surrounded by evil strangers and I pray

///////////////////////////

Somehow I always end up here

creeping through buildings abandoned

Waiting for the monsters to appear

///////////////////////////

Even my superpowers cannot save me

Strength and wisdom

are meaningless in this realm of dream

///////////////////////////

I should know by now they will never change

my dreams know me and I them

Each night a subconscious meeting is arranged

///////////////////////////

Against my will I am forced to attend

a wall of frustration a portent of doom

Night after night terrors they send

///////////////////////////

Until the sunlight streams once again

I am bound to these phantasms

Because I cannot bear to look away from them

///////////////////////////

Waking exhausted, shaken, and unnerved

yet, out of morbid curiosity, I cannot bear to look away

What will tonight's demons serve?

//////////////////////////

Oh, for a dreamless night

a calm, peaceful rest for body and soul

where my vivid imagination does not take flight.

Oh, what I'd give for just one dreamless night