Fragments

Fragments of a night
Lost in translation.
I fall asleep over a book,
I wake up to check my phone.
Bombings in Brussels, terror in the airport, blood in the streets.
My cozy room, my cat on the pillow next to me.
I can't sleep. It's too cold.
I turn up the heat. It's too hot.
I'm hungry, I'm thirsty.
I walk downstairs to the kitchen. I walk back upstairs to my bedroom.
I check my phone. I'm too tired to sleep.
Finally a dream:
Men caged like animals screaming in pain.
Other men ravishing their insides with bloody faces.
Howls of anguish, moans of desire.
Cannibals all, chained to a wall.
Then you walk in
But, in my dream, you are an ancient warrior spattered with blood.
You flash me a smile as if to say: "Honey, I'm home."
As if death and battle were just another day at the office.
My alarm goes off. I check my phone.
A bloodbath in Belgium. That was no dream. The horror is real.
I open the shades to let in the sun.
Now I can see
That you and my room and the world have always been this way.
But I had never seen it with my own eyes
Until last night.

Rosalind Resnick
March 22, 2016