Last night I had a dream that was so vivid that I have not even taken
time to shower and dress myself this morning before logging on to my computer
to write down every tiny detail that I can remember from it. I expect that a
late-night reading of The Omega Course
after Alex had gone to bed was to blame; it had filled my head with images of
cadavers rising from their graves and sinister magicians re-animating the
skulls of the deceased. I really should start reading romance novels at bedtime
instead!
I recall finding myself
standing in a grand chamber as large as, if not larger than, the Great Hall at
the university. It was sparsely furnished and dimly lit and although I could
not smell my surroundings I could detect a suffocating air of decay that filled
the chamber and made me feel ill at ease. A row of dark and tattered, seemingly
fire-damaged old flags adorned the stone wall ahead of me and a red carpet ran from
left to right along the entire length of the room. At the far end of the carpet
to my right was a bright and gleaming golden throne that was stunningly beautiful
but far too tall and narrow to seat an average-sized person.
Although I was unable to turn
my head to see them, I was aware of other people on either side of me who, like
me, were standing on a series of small red mats that had been placed at regular
intervals along the carpet and facing the central aisle. I watched the shadows
of these figures move on the opposite wall as though ordered by an inaudible command
and they knelt on their mats and bowed down until they were almost prostrate on
the floor. A voice from the silhouetted figure on the mat beside me whispered “bow
your head down. They must not see you. The living are not supposed to be here”
and so I knelt with unquestioning compliance and bowed down until the top of my
head touched the floor.
No sooner had I done this when a dull roar began to build from the far end
of the chamber to my left, like the sound of a slow steam train rolling into a
station. Within minutes the roar had grown until it had reached a deafening pitch
overhead and so I raised my chin a little and peeked out of one eye to catch a
glimpse of the source of the sound. Almost directly in front of me, only a few inches
or so away at the most, I could see the feet of a large band of figures
marching from left to right along the central aisle. The feet were identifiably
human but they had the same skeletal form and white-green phosphorescent glow
that I had seen before.
I desperately wanted to see the creatures in their full glory but the warning
from the person beside me echoed in my mind and, although my body was exposed and
they could clearly see me before them, for some strange reason I knew that if
we made eye contact then they would be alerted to my presence, so I held my
breath and squeezed my eyes tightly shut as the roaring noise passed directly
overhead and the group moved away to my right. When the ordeal was over and the
noise had died away, I opened my eyes and stole a glance along the carpet. The
room was silent and both the skeletal figures and the men beside me were gone.
I would not say that it was a disturbing dream, on the contrary it was a
fascinating and compelling dream and if I had not awoken at that point then I would
have been perfectly happy to endure it for much longer, especially now that Luke
has instilled in me the confidence to explore and engage with these lucid dreams
more directly. And this new-found confidence that Luke has instilled in
me is spilling over into other unusual phenomena that I encounter in my daily
routine too; for instance, the dark evenings have become a playground for the
senses and most recently I have noticed a luminous glow that is visible on
surfaces around the flat in the pitch dark of the night. I first stumbled
across this strange glow when visiting the toilet in the middle of the night; it
looked as though moonlight was reflecting off the surfaces in the bathroom and
transforming the room into a black-and-white photograph, but the blinds were tightly
closed and there was no light whatsoever coming into the room. I have since discovered
that if I sit completely still in the pitch dark for long enough then my
environment transforms entirely into black and white and I can see the white
outline of objects around me, but I have to look slightly out the corner of my
eye if I wish to maintain the effect when moving around the room. Normally I
would be disturbed by this kind of sensory abnormality, but I am more accepting
of them now. Besides this one has practical benefits when trying to safely negotiate
my way around the flat at night!
Although last night’s dream has not alarmed me, I was nevertheless grateful
for the distraction of another set of photographs and a poem from Luke when I logged
on to my computer only a few minutes ago…
It Was Sweet to My Heart
I have been steeped in liquor amnii
Too many
times now.
I am weary from my fights
with the majestic rage,
the relentless desire,
the heat of fury
And the all-consuming thirst.
with the majestic rage,
the relentless desire,
the heat of fury
And the all-consuming thirst.
The battle is won.
Now I hear
The groaning of the clouds,
The grind of the earth
And the cries from the throat
Of the blood-red rose.
I am timeless and constant.
Now I hear
The groaning of the clouds,
The grind of the earth
And the cries from the throat
Of the blood-red rose.
I am timeless and constant.
Keep your vigil,
little candle,
As the dusk bleeds the sunlight away.
As the dusk bleeds the sunlight away.
