My nightmare was filled with terror…and I longed for it to end
I was pulled into the darkest of woods
Very much alone…quiet…empty…nothing
The absence of color so stark
I could not tell the difference between myself
and what surrounded me
Lines blurred,
Tears stained,
Body weighted…
Mind…numb…
I moved laboriously through the darkness, crawling on my knees, clenched in pain
and drowning in an ocean of continuous tears
Adrift
I could only feel my own heart being suffocated
In my very body
The pain authentic and unparalleled
I almost died there. I lie still wanting to
But…
Somehow…
I kept moving forward while chains with padlocks kept holding me hostage
With no key to unlock them
I tried to discern which part of me would survive this absence of color as I drudged on trying to break free
Time passed excruciatingly slowly at first
The heaviness unbearable
I was blinded by both the darkness and the absence of my very foundation
With nothing to hold onto…but a small thread which lingered there
Somehow, time began to creep forward ever faster,
The thread began spinning out of sequence forming a fabric which I hardly recognized, because I could not yet see it
The chains broke open
and I sensed something new to hold onto
And when I could go no further in the darkness
.
Light crept in beneath my heart and split open the darkness with a vibrant sound
Brightness whirled around just enough to let me see fractals of color
As the color began to spin gloriously around me I suddenly opened up to the light
as nightmare spun into a dream
a dream of a future
and it was all mine
Out of the woods
Free of the darkness
Then…it came to me
The nightmare had taught me what real love is
And how lucky am I to have found it.
I will have it with me forever.
Written by Lynne Johnson
November 17, 2023
Cancer Wife 