By Hallie J Carl
Do you dream about me?
I dream about you.
My eyes flutter awake in the morning,
discerning if it was a memory or not.
It causes me to shake.
In my dream last night,
you yelled at me that I didn’t help you.
Then you came and gave me a kiss on my head,
like a mother to a child.
It causes me to shutter.
In my disorienting dream,
you watched me walk through familiar spaces as a stranger.
Unknown and unseen.
A wisp of who I used to be.
It causes me to crumble.
But when I awake from the dream
reality hits me with a flood.
I search each day
for new markers, new moments.
Trying to not look back.
Grief is a new friend,
one I had not previously known this closely.
It’s constant protection of my body and mind,
helps me to cope and make sense of the mourning.
I have no energy to look forward or back.
“I cannot change the things that happened
I can only learn and move forward,” they say.
But their words haunt me
because my brain and heart are not forward,
they are fighting the urge to look back.
So today I start over
as I did the day before
and as I will tomorrow.
Looking not ahead or behind but right now.
Turning pain into a portal.
I stumble into memories
of moments that hold great value.
They dance in my mind,
weaving around like a vine invading a foundation.
Turning pain into a portal.
There’s a bench overlooking a stream
trees rooted and tall around it.
A person sits, head down and weeping,
another person joins them.
Turning pain into a portal.
Storytime with Hallie 
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