Transmissions from the Dreaming

[Part One - The Journey to The Gates of Dreaming] – A ‘Story’

April 5, 2010 at 1:18 am (Uncategorized)

“Give me the goddamn T-Block motherfucker!”

Strange moments passing into memory before much has been noticed.  Quiet reflection upon everything and nothing, drawing into hapless spirals twisting away into Oblivion.  Ashes fall quietly to come to rest amongst mass graves of coffin nails ends.  Passing no certain boundary set by physics, smoke weaves itself in all dimensions, dancing lazily in the still room.
“Damn it Tucker!  Put away that treacle and destroy the little birdy as commanded!”  Screams a thought from somewhere across the railroad tracks in my Sub-conscious.
“What?”  I reply, curious as to what I meant, and if it was even I who the voice had been addressing in the first place.

“I’unno.”  An uninterested answer returns, the presence fading away into the dark night of my sleepless mind.

“Cheeky fucker…”  I murmur, yawning and coughing up further proof that I need to quit smoking.  “Wonderful…  Blacker than my soul…  Just… Wonderful.”

The Edge of IT nears as I wander throughout the labyrinthine pathways of my head, stumbling over discarded pornography, sex toys, empty beer bottles, and countless empty pens, balled up pieces of paper that didn’t quite make the grade.  ‘Was that a nun clad in a full body latex habit?’ I ask myself as I trudge through the waste and begin the harrowing decent into the darker regions of the Soul.  The air is dry and feels as sandpaper on my lungs as I continue onward, trying ever so often to figure out just why I’m actually going this far.  The only answer that awaits each time is an empty laughter, no more than a hissing chuckle, from the darkness.  ‘Ah…  Here we are…  About time I’ve had some company.’

“Alright… I’m tired of this ladder bullshit.”  I punctuate my statement with throwing myself from my imagined ‘safe’ perch upon the ladder and let myself fall, plummeting through the Nothing Which Is.

“Won’t you come out and play with  me?” A faint voice upon the silence, musical and fading fast, though recognizable enough.

“Martika?  Not exactly what I had pictured to be playing in the darker recesses of my so called ‘Mind’, but I suppose it is fitting after all.”  I reply.  “Left, right, left, we all fall down…”

The world spins away and there I am left in the midst of a dying city, the buildings crumbling and decaying, the last souls holding out against the End.  Their fires burn like beacons, dotting the fallen giants of Capitalism, the light dancing behind the last of the broken dirty glass that once adorned every building that now lay in resigned defeat.  Pulling an imagined cigarette from the air, I puffed on it until it lit, blowing the smoke from my nostrils and surveying the extent of the damage done to the once bustling Metropolis.  Perhaps…  Perhaps there were a few left that still remembered how to Dream.  Perhaps there still remained those who had held on to childish fantasies, kindling the flame within their hearts with carefully removed sections of what little remained of Hope.

“Hold fast to dreams for if dreams die, life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly.”  A soft whisper upon the unfelt breeze.  “Remember….”

Seventh Grade; Reading Class…  The quote had been framed upon the wall.  I stared at it more than I payed attention to my given assignments.  For whatever reason, I had never remembered the name of the person who had originally said it.  It was never that important.  At least, not until now.  Though even the importance of the origination of an ephemeral voice from the Past faded away as I pondered on the quote.  The starless sky above rolled and moved, shifting hues of grays, purples, blues, and other colors that humans have yet to find and name.  A troubled sky, as on edge and troubled as the person standing below them, wondering why such things ‘Just Are’.  Surely in my own imaginings I could have willed it to be anything I wished, but it didn’t seem right to change something that lent a helping hand to the Mood of my Journey.  I halfway expected to encounter Virgil, standing just outside the crumbling Gates of the City, patiently awaiting my arrival so that he might guide me through my own nine levels of Hell.  A shame for Virgil that at those very same Gates I was imagining some very unsavory types of creatures that happened to have quite a sweet tooth for Poets who thought they knew where they were.  Indeed, it was a shame that I imagined poor Virgil being carried off amongst the growls and hisses, into the darkness to be made useful as food for the critter’s offspring.  ‘I do hope he left the bottle of Wine…’ I thought, tossing the spent cigarette into the air where it became a large gray moth that flew off into the night.

All Roads Lead to The City…  All of them…  Walk long enough in any direction, and you will reach it.  You will know you are nearing it when the shadows reach for you and cry out in silence for missed opportunities and second chances, from the crows that gather to watch the travelers and call out jeers and insults and tormenting comments, laughing insanely the whole while.  Aye…  You’ll know The City…  It is the only one there ever was.  All others were simply echoes of this once great crossroads of Time and Tune.

“Time and Tune?”  I ask myself, wondering why I chose that instead of something more eloquent and professional or mysterious sounding.

“Because you’re fucking tired, burned out, and more than a little ready to viciously maul the Sandman when he appears.  Stop talking to yourself.  It’s only filling the ‘pointless humor’ slot, and at this point, it’s doing a pretty piss poor job of it.”  The writer responded, growling in a dangerous manner.

“Fine… Fine.”  I say, trudging onward towards the great Gates of The Dead City.  “But just so you know, you’re as good as Me right now, so you’re really only talking to yourself.”

“Fuck OFF!”  A thundering voice boomed from the skies above; purple lightning flashing, mountains crumbling away to dust, and seas drying up to salty sand canyons that smelled of death.

Giving a finger to the voice I continued on in silence.  Tempting a writer who holds a pen is like poking a known psychopath when he’s holding his favorite killing utensil and there’s no one else around.  It all ends about the same way too.  One way or another, the Writer wins because while the pen may write and create and channel the very essence of the Soul, it can also be used to stab you in very sensitive areas that don’t function so well with holes in them.

There, rising from the creeping darkness, stone webbed with scars of previous unknown encounters with harder objects and time, The Gates loomed.  I approached and looked around, suddenly quite intent on finding that bottle of wine that Virgil had been so kind to let me have before he was pulled away on more pressing matters.  It stood next to a green military backpack that had seen better days.  Strange spirals and sygils adorned random parts of the canvas.  Grabbing the bottle I uncorked it with my teeth and took a heavy pull, hoping that it hadn’t somehow turned to vinegar while I was on my way.  My senses were assaulted by strange tastes and sensations; cold and hot, opium and gin, milk and honey…  I took another pull and capped it, sliding into the only empty slot on the backpack.  Throwing the bag over my shoulder I looked around and sighed.  I really didn’t feel like moving any more.  In fact.  I figured I could easily make camp here until the time I woke up from a nap or slumber or coma and continue on my way from there.  Glancing around with a paranoid cloud hanging over my head, I shrugged and set up camp, stringing up the hammock so thoughtfully provided by Virgil between two stone pillars.  I lay back in it when I had finished and watched the troubled clouds shift, ever so often turning my head to hear some lewd joke the crows near me were telling.  Their voices came in interrupted bursts, a set up here, two punch lines there…  Pulling my blades from the bag, I armed myself and readied for what I figured was going to be one hell of a strange night.

As my eyes grew heavy and the lids slowly closed, faint music drifted out over the hills and to my ears.  A soft haunting melody that led me to believe that I wasn’t the only one in this strange wasteland of my Mind.  Then again… I never was.

With that I grasped my blades tighter and fell into sleep, not making a single ripple when I hit.

[Fin of Part 1]