Camera lenses for my eyes
Focus, focus on me
Deep underwater
A place uninhabited
Except by fellow dreamers

I see myself
Underwater
Hair flowing
Arms flailing
Tears blend with salty sea
I watch my body drown

There are others around me
Breathing in non-existent oxygen
Looking curiously
At this drowning girl

I am screaming
Please help my body breathe
People
Other dreamers
They move on

I watch as my body
Gives a last spasm
My spine arches
My eyes empty of spirit
Camera eyes focus
Focus, focus on my face
I see myself dead
I see myself drowned

My body moves
Lifts by underwater currents
Floating
Eyes open but unseeing

I focus camera eyes
I hate seeing this

My body drifts to the top
Top of this water filled planet
I float on the surface
Staring with empty eyes
Between water and space
Dead
The only one dead
Dead and alone

Awake
Gasp
God, I can breathe
Once again
My face is wet with tears
Head is spinning

I am so sick of this
Tonight is an anniversary
Tonight marks five hundred
Five hundred times I have had this dream
Five hundred unrestful sleeps
Five hundred days of drowning

I have died more times
Than seems fit
For a child such as myself

We tend to often feel the sensation of one drowning when we are trying to avoid facing things in our lives, or are afraid of letting go.

This is a powerful write. For it delves into the power by which the unconcious mind never forgets that which we are desperately trying to keep buried.

I liked this.

Safe journey
Aiyana

I can relate. Not to the drowning but in relation to The Civil War. I wrote of it long ago in a poem called "The Gift". It was an epic 8 pages! I also wrote it as a short story. I had it so often, and it was so real and vivid that I had many talks with my wife about it and eventually wrote it down. It was so dark, sad, and full of death. I could taste it, smell it. I woke up so many times in tears over the overwhelming flood of sorrow that swept over me. It was quite overpowering and manipulative...this dream. It really affected me. After I wrote about it, it just stopped...as suddenly as it had begun.

Your poem reeled me back into memories of that dream. Your poem is very vivid - cinematic is a word I like to use to describe poems such as this. The feelings you feel are well communicated. I almost feel as though I am there.

My hope is that you experience the same resolve I did in that writing it down will make it go away. Remembering it isn't so bad. It's living it over and over that hurts the most. We all have scars. I will be cheering for you to resolve this dream.

In solidarity,

Kevin

I agree with Kevin's description of "cinematic". Masterful camerawork, here.

~Much Love~
Megan