Red Ghost

I saw a ghost last night. He haunted my restless sleep. Made me dream in color, in red, in blood. He's been absent for quite some time now, but last night he appeared again. As always his face is blurred out, not like that of a tv program hiding identity, but more like the inability of a camera to focus on a fast moving object. In my dream I felt no physical pain, had no voice to scream. I just held the fear that I recognize from my distorted memory. The paralyzed and dry fear that I remember.

Unlike it was in reality, I was outside last night. A warm rain was falling all around me, but not on me, and I wanted so badly to be comforted by the normally enchanting patter of the raindrops. My face was pressed this time in dirt, my right cheek aching from the pressure. I hear the sound of bass, beating steady as if a car full of teenagers is driving by. After a moment, I realize the bass is my heart, echoing with each beat, making it sound as if I have two. As if the second beat is encouraging the first beat to repeat. Don't Stop, it pounds. Don't Give Up.

And then I realize it: the ghost I see is not my enemy; my enemy is there, yes, but the ghost is my angel, my second heart beat, my faith that I too, like so many others, would survive this.

I wake up and see that I have been asleep for all of 12 minutes. The night has just begun.