Dreams Never Sleep

A father strives to finally getting it right,

succumbs to repeated nights of sweat drenched insomnia.

Somewhere,

he stumbles about

to clear the child’s room,

guitar,

video games,

posters.

Broad stairs to the garage,

once of stable hardwood,

now rickety rotted support

creaking of memories in flames

lead to once plush carpet soft with warmth,

now but cold cinders beneath his feet.

Sensory deprivation smiles,

Releases remembered  glimpses of love

once bathed by generous moonlight

spilling from window

to banister

to door

to now barren concrete.

Here,

children’s eyes once visualized

what freedom’s flight would be like.

The father wanders outside,

stares blankly on the gray-white night

reflecting off algae encrusted pool,

now with but deflated basketball

adrift.

Through surrounding weeds and shrubs,

GI Joe action figures shimmer their loneliness as well,

staring like him at the pool’s granite carved beachhead,

imagination’s vast ocean of backyard fantasy now quiet,

make-believe war long before

reduced to the calm of real battles lost,

a city’s jungle rot now merged with other toxic fumes

saturating all.

No prisoners taken.

History.

The scuffling of his slippers

rake the humid night’s heaviness

like sandpaper dragging across

memory’s fine threaded tapestry.

Lying down among the overgrowth,

he peers through broken limbs,

crumbling leaves,

moon,

water,

house.

Eyes squeezed shut deliver regret’s creative gallery,

a lifetime installation perhaps never meant to be walked through,

yet…

Such are musings,

sometimes destined

to be but nightmares another time,

while the heart’s dreams remain forever awake.