Lament of the Mind

I have a lot of nights like this.

I sit, staring at my walls, or at my computer.

At a name, or at a picture.

My mind likes to float off. I’m a dreamer. I don’t belong here.

Then something happens… a memory, or a feeling. Something brings me back. Shatters the illusion.

I feel the shards cut me. Pain. Stabbing, slicing. 

The dreams are false. The worlds I build inside my head aren’t real.

In reality, I’m nothing. I simply exist.

I often look around, wanting someone to share my dreams with. I wish so often I could let someone see the beauty that I hold of.

I realize too quickly there is no one. Friendships are but ephemeral. People don’t mind the surface niceties, but no one dares look at what’s beneath.

I don’t approach them, of course. You can’t bring something like this to someone and expect them to want it before they understand what it is.

And of course, no one dares approach me.

The moment passes. I find distraction, or drift off into dream. The cycle repeats.

The shards, of course, cut deeper every time the illusion is broken. Just a little bit, hair’s width deeper each time, but enough that it stings more and more.

Some day, I expect the shattering to take this world with it. I expect that I’ll be unable to handle being brought back to the real world, and will simply let the world fall away.

It’s nearly happened before, you know.

Until then, though… I dream.