Nightsweats
She forces her eyes shut
Tighter and tighter
Until she sees shapes and lights
That she draws with her mind
Torn between the two
She doesn’t know
If the shapes are forming
Reality or dreams
But she knows
She can no longer inhale
And her voice is stolen
For she says to herself
“scream, scream so loud
So they can save you”
She opens her mouth and hears gasping
Maybe if she’s lucky
she’ll mutter something incomprehensible
And talk about fingers and toes
All the while
Choking on her own fear
Her thoughts run rapid
Memories flashing ferociously
Yet none set as concrete
So they become distorted
Scattered skulls
broken bodies
Little ladies
With bare backs
caught in cages
Shouting sounds
That echo in the distance
Her mind transcends
Caught between realities
Trapped in those moments before death
Where she lets her body relax
Preparing for nothingness
Fearing eternity
She says to him
“take me. I’m ready”
But somewhere amongst
living and dying
her room becomes a ward
Where her bed is engulfed by bars
She hears the nurses shuffling their feet
And doctors telling her to keep quiet
“ssshhh…it’s a secret” they whisper
“just lay very still, and it will all be over”
She hears the beeping of the machines
And aeroplanes flying overhead
She knows the pilot all too well
As she feels the plane crash
While children are playing in an empty room
Desolate
she screams to the pilot
who lies paralysed
“get up! Get up!
Your children need you”
She hears the pilot’s apathy
And cradles the children in her arms
As the house crumbles behind her
Fading into darkness
Away from the nurses
And machines
And the pilot
She wakes exhausted
Damp sheets
Covered in her sweat
She looks outside
The sun is rising
Relief floods her skin
She has survived
One more night.