What dreams are these that drift inside?
Long autumns stretched out in whispers.
Muted colors strewn about, mixing but unblended.
Gold and crimson fall as bland as black and white
When they are the only colors one can see.

Alive but swollen deep within.
Constricted tight, laboring with each breath that eases out unnoticed,
Like this endless season.
The air chilled but not descript enough to be called cold.
The air without motion, but not rested enough to be called still.
The air thick, but not pungent enough to be called stale.

This fading light cannot be called dusk.
That would imply the setting of a sun that once shone bright
And the coming of a night that would curtain the earth
In anticipation of the inevitable unveiling of some new dawn.
This fading light cannot be called such
Because it’s a fade that only fades ever more,
And never reaches true black.
Its credits never end.

Discontent is the perfect word for such a powerfully uneasy feeling.
But no such word claims right to the sensation I now bare.
I have not the intensity within to summon meaning in my meaninglessness
And let it pour out on this page.
I find not the interest or the desire forthwith to force said interest.
I find only a general dissatisfaction that tastes not sour enough to be bitter.
Nor bitter enough to be sour.
I haven’t even the inclination to spit the taste from my mouth
And examine its splatter upon this earth.
Yet I have not the preference for it to remain beneath my tongue,
Spoiling my words, my voice,
As it rolls up out of my throat and crawls unheard through the air,
Dissipating off in directions that leave it lingering into silence.
Not unlike that light that falls short of completely fading out.

My pains are not uncommon.
My ambition resides in memory,
Right beside my hopes and desires.
Nestled comfortably in that constricted, swollen vessel buried in my chest.
Where the old dreams drift,
Floating about clumsily in a place that no one can remember.

If words were like coins,
I suppose the other side of love would be memory.
Little else makes sense.
Into whatever slot you might drop that one,
You can at least rest assured that in that slot it will remain.
To never again be earned or spent by another.

Had I the energy to move my thoughts,
I might realize that promises can’t be broken
If no one remains to care whether or not they are kept.
And that broken hearts no longer need mending,
If the owners no longer follow their beat.
I might muse that complacency is fatal,
Once it robs from you the last ping of wanting in life.
I might ruminate that ruminations are for women
Knitting scarves in rocking chairs,
Not for winos plunking about on their keyboards in the night.

So it would seem through all this effort,
My question will ultimately go unanswered,
But there would be a certain symmetry to that.
I guess I’ll find a shallow solace in the fact
That I need not know the nature of my dreams.
I need only to acknowledge that I still dream them.
And that more often then not,
Their only subject is you.