The Lost Lands of Dreaming

It had been many weeks
Since sleep
Had carried the dreamer
Beyond the waking world.

Reality had become
Loud.
Heavy.
Uncertain.

Yet, in the quiet hours
Before dawn,
Sleep finally deepened,
And once again
The Ocean of Dreams
Called them home.

They awoke upon the seabed.

Great dunes of pale sand
Stretched endlessly
Towards the horizon.

Seashells lay exposed,
Their songs long silenced.
Ancient shipwrecks
Rested crooked
Upon dry earth,
The ocean
Had quietly abandoned
This world.

The light house on the peninsula,
No longer shined a guiding light,
The sky hung grey and charcoal,
The dunes connected desolation,
To death.

The wildflowers lay lifeless,
Brown dry and withered,
The stench of rotting flora,
Filled the sleeper’s senses.

The willow trees hung like skeletons,
over dried thought ponds,
where the bones of dreamfish dried.

The edge of the great forest
Seemed hollow and emptied,
No longer a dividing wall,
It was now open for all to see,
As the dreamer walked within,
Every tree stood barren,
Their trunks black from burning,
Ashes covered the empty ground.

Great ribcages rose from the ash
Like broken cathedrals.
Entire packs of Devourers
Lay where they had fallen
Their hungry jaws still open,
As though death
Had caught them Mid-howl.

The mountain peak itself
Was but a grey stone.
Hanging in the landscape,
Bereft of snowy caps
And its lush forest base.
Low grey clouds crowned
It’s forgotten peak.

There was nothing here for the dreamer
No beauty remained.

The Cranes were absent
From the sky above,
Replaced by a brewing storm
That darkened the land,
And no songbirds sung.

Back standing upon the peninsula,
Looking out over the vacant sea,
The ground shook and lifted,
Rumbling as the great serpent
Grimvael began his approach.

Perhaps this was the cause,
For the grim vista
They were now unable to escape.

Grimvael breached the surface
Red eyed and hungry,
Its vast black mouth opened.

The serpent consumed
Both dream and dreamer.
Darkness fell.
Then a violent gasp.

Rain lashed the bedroom window.
Thunder rolled
Across the waking world.

The dreamer
Sat upright,
Listening.

Hoping that Grimvael
Had remained behind.

While all the time knowing
That the great serpent
Always remained within.