Dreamscapes: A Face of Five Pointed Scars

 Panic…

…the need to run, my fight being flight, and the only sound is my breathing in staccato as I push my body to a speed it has no choice but to accept, the landscape a peripheral blur, the door an in focus goal…

…my left hand makes contact with the seasoned wood of the door, my right with the iron handle, what should be rhythmic is out of time —push down, push open— I refuse to look behind, instead I exhale and quietly ask for entrance, to which the door replies in kind…

…I slam it shut, surrounded by darkness, I feel towards the left of me, following the stone wall to an entrance, a cavernous darkness I allow to swallow me, where in wait I fear my breathing will give me away…

…the door opens with patience, slowly completing its swing, as it allows golden sunlight to softly touch the shadows, an incandescence that barely illuminates a full length mirror within the room I stand…

…a first step onto the stone floor, a second, the third brings his profile into view, he inhales and exhales with no sign of exertion, and he turns, looking directly at me, a face of five pointed scars, a pentagram of permanence carved into his flesh, a pentacle of protection…

…I forget myself, studying his visage, my mind overflowing with words and images, my body reading his energy, and him allowing me space to make sense of the bombardment…

…my mind finally slowing to the image of a pomegranate and an athame…my right hand beginning to ache and feel wet…I look to see blood slipping through my fingers, dripping upon the stone floor…

…I look back to him and then to the mirror, to which I approach, he slowly following at a safe distance, allowing me to feel secure and not flee like a doe into the thicket…

…I see his reflection, an apparition looming behind me, so I close my eyes and place both hands on the mirror, the blood thickening and slowing into small tear-shaped seeds that collect at my feet…

…I extend my right hand behind me, to which he approaches, his fingertips whisper atop mine, and then the pull forward through time’s fluidity, and when I open my eyes, I’m staring at him through the veil, his hand upon the mirror in confusion…

…what I’ve seen is prophetic, our minds are labyrinthine, with him running through mine, and I through his, and just when we think we’ve solved the mazes in both, a new ending begins, with only one at the finish line…

…we are inevitable, we are fated, we are lore, but only in our almosts…

…until that is, he picks the pomegranate seeds up from the floor, eating them one by one, and with each seed consumed, the veil waivers more and more, until the portal opens and he reaches his hand through…

Lizzie O. July 2025

Dreamscapes: Cemetery

The cemetery appears in my dreams at least once a month for the last year, always the same layout; plots of land that my mind registers as squares from an aerial perspective, a stone wall that stretches the perimeter, tall trees both deciduous and coniferous, shrubs that flower in spring and berry in winter, and the road that winds serpentine down hill and then will suddenly morph into harshly angular corners. I think it’s of value to note that this is not a cemetery I’m familiar with, nor is it an amalgamation of cemeteries I’ve been to, this is uniquely its own. I only enter and exit from one location, overgrown with vines and brambles, although I can see the other portal off in the distance, behind it acres of land pierced with large, white marble crosses. People who visit the cemetery will be carrying on their business, walking, visiting graves, driving through, without an acknowledgement of my presence. The seasons will change, sometimes it’s early autumn with the hint of color beginning to radiate from leaves, other times it’s winter and the trees are skeletal. I can hear the leaves rustle in breezes and I can feel the chill of shadows and the warmth of sun. I feel anxious in this cemetery. I fear crossing an invisible line that only I register. I know how far I can go, before I feel the anxiety grip me. I become seized with a terror before the unseen takes hold. I see the phantoms moving about, weaving between headstones and tree trunks, and they see me and keep me on their radar. I never reveal their existence to anyone accompanying me, I just study their behaviors and silently acknowledge they exist. In one iteration of the dream, I was a passenger in a gold sedan, the driver I couldn’t define, as they had a voice and a presence, but I was deaf to their words and they weren’t registering in my direct line of sight, just my periphery. They kept driving slowly toward the forbidden, as I begged for the windows to be up and the doors locked, a death grip on the arm rest. I felt all their eyes on me, dead stares, and their intentions to approach the passenger side of the car. I felt panic and noticed that as we drove deeper into my most feared section of the cemetery, the sun became eclipsed, and darkness and shadows of unsettling lengths and shades began to encapsulate the car. I finally yelled, “We need to go back!” The driver kept driving, their speed slowing. Chilled and incapable of regulating my breathing I yelled, “Turn around!” The driver cackled, stopped, and slowly turned the car around. We slowly left the unwelcoming section of the cemetery, the sun coming back at an angle of late afternoon, and I took note of the leaves fluttering in the breeze, the sun glinting off them like they were coated in silver, as if they were flashbulbs from cameras capturing my escape. The latest dream had me in a light blue car, slowly entering the cemetery and driving in my most feared direction. My vision became deprived, like wearing blinders, a tunneled view of horror. I whispered, “I can’t.” The car continued on the path. I said it firmer, “I can’t.” And then a voice, masculine and encouraging, “You’re safe.” The car then pulled into a small parking spot overlooking my terror. I went to speak, but a soft hand settled atop mine and those words again, “You’re safe.” The doors unlocked and the blinders fell away, my full vision returned, and then the sound of the driver side door opening and shutting, a shadow crossing in front of the car as I looked at the door handle. There was no rush. No door being opened for me. It was to be my choice, my doing. I finally mustered the strength to open the passenger door and step outside, closing the door and feeling the chill from overcast late fall weather. I looked upon the forbidden plots and then focused on my companion; a griffin. It walked to a small, two story Tudor caretaker’s house of stone, slate, and diamond latticed windows. It entered and turned to me, so I followed, unsure but willing. I turned and looked upon my terror, the dead walking their paths, and each time they would look up and towards me, their heads would fall loose on their necks, only allowing them to stare at the ground. I exhaled the breath I’d been holding and crossed the threshold, the door closing and latching, securing me inside. Red. The walls, the carpet, the fabric on furniture, all red. That masculine voice again, soft and sure, “You’re safe.” The griffin advanced towards and then up the stairs. I followed. The singular room had triple windows on every wall. I noticed that there was a bed, and I was struck by the realization that I needed to rest. I could lay down and face the windows that frame my nightmare, or I could lay down with my back to it. The griffin kept its eyes on me, but never rushing my decision. I finally laid down, my back to my nightmare, my eyes heavy with exhaustion, and the windows I faced a knotwork of English ivy. The griffin gently got up on the end of the bed, sitting guard at my feet, its eyes on the view to my nightmare, and as I drifted off to sleep, a sleep within a dream, that masculine voice again washed over me, “You did amazing.

Lizzie O. August 2025

 A sudden realization of coming to consciousness in darkness, surrounded by a screaming in all directions, that porcelains my flesh and concusses the back of my head, an audible ferocity of words in a language I can’t decipher

I feel bitten by his diablerie and spit out by his spleen

I make stories of the scenes that captivate hours in sun cast shadows and arachnid baiting, of vulture princes feasting on rot and viruses, and motes of dust fusing into amorphous beings phantoming a dance in the coastal breeze

I feel his stare like a stoning punishment

I want him to read the story of my lives, those living and dead, in retellings of flaws within my flesh, in the shallow and deep scars, the mutant stretch marks, in freckled constellations and portent tattoos

I won’t deny the longing and hunger for the sanguine spilled rug burns of the white room, with floor to ceiling windows that drench the wanting sex of feral psyches in sunlight

Your vulnerable neck in my grasp, your heart a delicacy to my palate, unbidden tears captivating crystal prophecies upon my hands

Solitary in form again, I watch from the window, the waves break and burn in sun phase hues, as the ghost of your voice widows at the shell of my ear, giving my head a haunting distant roar of loss and lust

I move to stand in the threshold of the door, in the realm of other, not in not out, and I star my limbs, suspended in the space of entranced or possible retreat

My celestial body becomes a wheel, slow spinning my metamorphic silk, a chrysalis of irritant effect, I take on a baroque pearl contour awaiting the splitting of life

Upon extraction of the bindings that happened my transmogrify, I haunt the house you built around thoughts of me and the wicked shape of my mouth, fevering the syllables of your name, the histrionics of your unbecoming

It’s a fine house you’ve crafted for me to haunt, bathed in dark actualization, that I decorate with tasseomancy finery and slipping candle wax, taxidermied nocturnals and minuscule houses constructed of leaves, whistling rust and framed whispers of your self-reproach

E. A. O'Connell. May 7, 2022.

{Excerpt}

The cherry trees line the stone wall of the graveyard. Within the curtain of ceaseless pink petals in ethereal flurry, azaleas in mind warping hues trumpet an electrifying aura that draws my eyes in a hummingbird frenzy. Lichen mist and moss velvet. Patinaed bronze and sangria maples. All is quiet. All is serene. Upon this landscape with a setting sun that opalesces the evening sky and imparts a glow to the new green unfurling, Death is holding his arms open in a gesture of kind…look at how time has allowed your grief to bloom…

E. A. O'Connell. May 2, 2022.

 a near kiss, framed within a coffee ring distress

and a moon phase ambush of cold saturation

a hand pushes to the glass

the world ignorant to its existence

but it pleads with me

—return my touch—

a fright of creation in monstrous hours

i breathe within the atmosphere of dream

but come to my consciousness

as a single finger taps atop my spine

a smile surfaces as my belly blooms a warmth

and in whisper i ask what kept them so long

E. A. O'Connell. April 29,. 2022

Morning Mindfulness

I think I may have befriended a sparrow…a tall and lean, brown sparrow. Whenever he perches atop the deck railing, he always does so with his back straight, making him taller than the other sparrows that I see perch all squat and plump atop overhead wires and picket fences. His lanky build calls to mind Jimmy Stewart, so perhaps there’s a name in relation that will suit him and come to voice.

So this little winged friend…I say friend, but in all reality I could be sadly mistaken, as he may very well dislike my presence on the deck and see me as an interloper who has suddenly begun invading his space…my work does keep me from fully enjoying the deck during day hours for a better part of the year, and I imagine he’s grown quite comfortable during his uninterrupted time…nevertheless, this little sparrow is not fearful of my human presence on the deck, rather he’s curious and ever so vocal. If I go outside to sit for a spell, enjoying a coffee and a book, he’ll fly above my head and land on the railing a few feet to the left of the Adirondack chair, staring at me and chirping incessantly. However, Tuesday afternoon, as I was reading a book, he flew right in front of my face…so close I could feel the breeze off his wing. He then landed on the railing, staring me down and chirping. I looked for signs of a nest or of hatchlings, but nothing to support the idea he was being territorial due to parental instincts. A crow sitting atop a shaded branch in the maple located in the yard across from the deck, hopped out onto a sunny branch and cawed thrice, causing my sparrow guest to go silent and fly away. His absence was short lived, always returning to investigate why a human is present, busying herself with prepping the deck for gardens or sweeping away leaves and pollen that collect in corners and under the bench pillows.

This morning he returned as usual, only I had opted to drink my coffee and read a book at the dining room table, my back to the open French doors that lead onto the deck…the temperate weather and cool breeze that was blowing through my home, scented with sun warmed hyacinth, tulips, and new green was too blissful to ignore…but there it was, his boisterous chirping, so I rose and stood at the door listening to him from his perch atop the frame for the ambient cafe lights. I bid him good morning, he looked in at me for a few minutes more, and then flew off. I decided in that moment to leave him blueberries for breakfast.

It’s midday and he hasn’t returned for his blueberries, but I’m hoping to find that they were enjoyed when I check on them later today. The question is, will it be the sparrow to taste of their sweetness, or Chunk Norris, the stout squirrel that daily visits the deck, leaving behind tell-tale signs of his presence, and who bides his time until summer, when he blatantly ravishes the vegetables and fruits grown in containers, only to leave in their place half-chewed peanuts still in the shell and poorly buried black walnuts.

Spring always brings with it a great many promises and possibilities that tend to carry straight through into summer. Nature and the Universe communicate in symbols, synchronicities, and parallels…and with recent events in my life bearing a weight I need to unload…I’m mindful to the sparrow’s sudden appearance and familiarity being more than just a coincidence.

E. A. O'Connell. April 14, 2022.

 A pentagon of gilded perimeter lit the hollow at the back of my eyes, a vow in the language of sacred geometry, a visual representation of the longing that emanates from my being…I hadn’t remembered falling asleep…I swear I had merely blinked…it’s usually in those moments of quiet darkness, when my world is lit by two headlights, the head on collision that doesn’t even make me flinch, I accept the crux of matter, and I escape as particles of energy and encompass a realm of parallel self…I revisit that headspace and find a phosphene hued door, the most simplistic of outlines, with the most daring of depths framed within…portals often hint at promises that may not be kept, but this one has a darkness that reaches back at me in covenant…a Möbius strip of risk and ricocheting recordings of the ambient infinite

E. A. O'Connell. March 15, 2022.