The City of Dreams

In the city of dreams it is always night time

and the black asphalt is wet from recent rain

so the streets shine.

The streets are paved with tarnished silver.

They gleam with pink ruby, red garnet, green peridot

blue sapphire, yellow citridine.

Emeralds and opals lead you deep

into the Aladdin’s cave where maybe you will find

the lamp like a gravy boat with a genie inside

and your wishes will be answered

because all that you have ever wanted

is nothing, no thing at all

just answers.

In the city of dreams the night time is the best time

because the wrong answers have gone away.

They have all withdrawn and fallen silent

in warm lairs full of furniture,

bathed in the lullaby glow of television screens,

silenced by the gentle clatter of cutlery and crockery,

sedated by seductive smells of cooking,

and curled up cozy in cushions and upholstery

until the only reminder

of their power to confuse and betray

is the gap between the tick and the tock of a clock,

the microsecond of silence

in the ebb and flow of sound.

In the city of dreams you go hunting in darkness,

you go searching the depths,

you enter the space between the lights,

for brightness will blind you

and only the secondhand glow of jewel colours

on wet pavements and roads

can guide your footsteps toward the monster

at the heart of the labyrinth,

around the next corner,

at the end of that alley,

waiting in that black doorway

where the shadow is denser and darker and more threatening

so maybe at last it might jump out and attack you.

In the city of dreams it is always night time

and it is always beautiful, lonely, scary

as you walk away from what is known,

as you turn your back on safety,

as you abandon all comforts,

and follow where it leads you –

that alarm buzzer in your belly that says

“Beware”—

for how can you face the future

without the answer,

how can you live your life in freedom

until you have found your fear

and know forever its face and its name.

The city of dreams can only be entered at night.

There will be no sun, no moon, no stars,

only the reflections on wet blackness of cold neon light

glowing like uncut unpolished gemstones

paving the path toward the unknown

which is your destination and your home,

for all that you have been is lost forever

and in between you and what you will be

is the abyss and the only clue, the only key,

the only Aladdin’s lamp containing your genie

must first be found

and from the terrible talons of nightmare fear reclaimed

over and over and over again.