Darkness

Lying alone in my bed,

In the depths of the moonless night,

I feel the darkness come awake.

I feel it stir in my soul.

Slithering up from my bowels,

Sending out its icy tendrils,

Feeling for my weakness,

Feeding on my pain.

Gripping my heart in a cold embrace

Fingers of despair claw my spine.

My mind is filled with darkness,

And death.

Shadows steal the light from my eyes.

Gloomy specters cloud my vision.

The shade of my failure

Haunts me from the blackness.

Nightfall is hours past

And daylight is a distant future.

Sunlight is a forgotten memory.

The darkness consumes me.

Drowning in my desolation.

Mired in my melancholy.

Hampered in my helplessness.

Apathetic in my agony.

My dour face is fallen

As I reminisce of being happy, once.

But that was long ago

Simply a half remembered recollection.

Now nothing but pain and hate are in me.

Revulsion rules my thoughts.

Disgust is all I can digest.

I loathe all about me, and me.

The darkness threatens to suffocate me.

My lungs are filled with a black haze.

Thick and rancid is the air around me.

A fetid, rotten atmosphere.

But there in the distance I see a flash.

A simple lessening of shadow.

A brief spark illuminating the dark.

A glowing ember of hope.

Coming closer now I see her

With a lantern swinging at her hip.

The darkness shrinks away from her

As she brings her radiance to bear.

Raising the light above her head

The luminosity lights the land.

Her fiery red hair glows

In the bright backwash.

Hope surges in my heart now

Burning away the icy grip.

Fire races up my spine

Smoldering the cold found there.

My eyes are ablaze.

Twin suns light up my face.

Faith fuels the fire of my future.

The darkness of my soul is banished.

My mind is now full of dreams

Of a future bright with aspiration.

My spirit yearning for freedom

Coveting all that was forgotten.

Caught up now on the wings of hope

I surge up out of my bed.

I rush down the path to meet her

And scoop her into my arms.

She has saved me from the darkness,

Moved me from night into the sun.

Given me flight to escape my failure

And the strength to live another day.

At the fringes of the light

Barely kept at bay.

The darkness waits patiently

Tolerant, it can wait.

Someday the light will fade,

Another time of darkness will come,

To consume me again.

I must be vigilant.