Lifetimes seem to pass, adrift through the murky haze of sleep, fading through foreign memories. Faces consigned to oblivion, a near infinite horizon above rolling hills and seas, lost from memories, until once more beckoned within a dream


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    The hues of dawn bleed across an ink-black sky, the last glimpse of a pearlescent moon sinking into shadow.


    A ray of blooming light slips past thick drapes, illuminating the dozens of books that lie scattered on the floor, piled in towers of parchment and ink, pages yellowed and worn by use.


    Two of three walls are hidden behind thick cases of burnished wood, shelves straining under the weight of bound words. Far kinder worlds are pressed between the pages, an escape from the pain of memories, of a life now out of reach.


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    The third is bare, save for a photo. Two stand within the frame of rich red mahogany, laughing under autumn leaves as daylight fades beyond the trees. Of all that lie within the room, the photo alone lays dust-free; polished, cherished, remembered as to never forget.


    The cloying scent of cinnamon fills the air, an untouched mug left on an otherwise bare desk. A lonesome figure sits unmoving, head slumped with a weariness of heart and mind.


    With the growing light of sun, they awake, eyes bleary, mind lingering in the last dregs of a blissful slumber, holding onto the fading moments of peace.


    Again I dreamt of a world beyond, sorrow lifted by wonder and awe. And as these moments fade, memories drifting beyond my grasp, reality falls ever harder, cruel and callous for all its indifference.


    Nought is left for me in this waking world, save for that formed by ink and imagination. Will I never know the land that lies within these fleeting dreams?