A Dream Without End**

This is the ever deepening sleep
Of the damned.
A dream without end
Which is no dream at all,
A reality of phantoms
Walking circular in quiet without
Purpose or repose.

Yours are the eyes that watched me,
Yours the arms that held me warm and close.
Now you do not know me,
Cannot focus on me or say my name,
Yet you stand and breathe as always,
An attenuated wraith.
You are less each day
Than the day before
As the countdown continues
To the final screeching bell.

This is the ever deepening sleep
Of the damned.
A dream without end
Which is no dream at all,
A reality of phantoms
Walking circular in quiet without
Purpose or repose.

I have become as the Lord
Perched here upon the top floor
Invisible to those passing below
While directing the unseen many
Spread out over the world.
And with each thought I superior manipulate
Another's acts as part of a clandestine plan --
Each who then reacts when told and how,
Still imagining a freedom from paucity.

This is the ever deepening sleep
Of the damned.
A dream without end
Which is no dream at all,
A reality of phantoms
Walking circular in quiet without
Purpose or repose.

I am too the destroyer of all.
This plague is reserved for those
Whose willful striving,
Constant as the sun,
Would not bend to blustering storms,
Would not run from the rising tide,
Whose determination to proceed
Was ever without doubt.
They like you are now sucked helpless
Straight-legged into the darkening vortex
Of thoughtless action
And eternal anxiety
Because.

This is the ever deepening sleep
Of the damned.
A dream without end
Which is no dream at all,
A reality of phantoms
Walking circular in quiet without
Purpose or repose,
Wandering into the sightless dark
Never to return.