My reality, bleak and gray day after day

same people, same things.

But the dream was filled with sparkles

bright pastel colors, my paradise world. 

In bright sparkling contrast to reality.

Happy for a time

Abruptly twisting into a terrible nightmare.

Changing and morphing

A new terrifying paradise, fears and deepest daydreams

Twisting into a horrifying briar of reality.

Like Alice lost in Wonderland.

Or little Red Riding Hood

Trying to make it through the forest

shadows and monsters at every turn.

I pass between the conscious and the subconscious

realizing that even my dreams

couldn’t shield me from my life, 

somehow someway I  would make my own paradise

and daydreams a reality.

And all the while being mindful of the nightmares that once ensnared me.