Its What I Do In The Middle of the Night

With the nightlight guiding me I sneak across my bedroom to the hall. I run on tiptoe down the hall to the stairs and carefully make my way downstairs. I take extra care not to step on the third step down nor on the one just before the last as they will creak and moan.
I sneak through the living room and into the kitchen where I open the refrigerator door. I take an apple for myself. I dash across the kitchen and take out two slices of bread. Unlatching the kitchen door, I make my way across the porch by moonlight, being careful not to trip on Daddy’s boots. I jump down three steps and across the yard, out the back gate and on to the dock.
I sit with my feet dangling above the water. I set my apple down and tear the bread into little tiny pieces and cast them on the water. Then I pick up my apple and begin to eat it by the light of the moon and the stars. I watch as the fish nibble on the bread making ripples that grow larger and larger reflecting sparkles of starlight and moonlight everywhere.
I wonder if somewhere high above me the ripples can be seen by the stars and the moon. As the night breeze tousles my hair, I lie back on the dock staring up at the night sky and finish my apple. I toss the core into the lake; make my way back up the dock and through the gate. I run across the yard and up the porch. Locking the door behind me, I make my way back across the living room and up the stairs, down the hall and into my bed to dream of water and stars and moonlight.

drowning light

The sun has set into the ocean and already the night has begun to intrude upon the light. In the eastern parts of the sky the lavender clouds are turning to a dark slate grey. Across the sky and the water bright streaks of yellow and orange remain but they are beginning to fade.
I must let go. I know I must or I will certainly drown but I can not. I hold you, my arms outstretched and desperate even though the brightness is descending deeper.
The oranges and yellows have turned to crimson and night is spreading further across the sky. The blues have deepened and softened and as if to mock me, Venus has appeared just above the horizon.
Still I hold on. Barely keeping my face out of the water, my fingers beginning to slip, I begin to recite all the reasons why I should let go – why I must let go. I can taste the salty water and am not certain whether I am drinking the ocean or my tears.
Across the sky now a deepened blue, stars begin to appear one by one and a harvest moon begins to rise casting its glow upon the water. “Let go,’ it calls to me. ‘Let go and live.”
But I cannot hear, my ears are filled with water. Then I see your face. As you look towards me, I know that I would rather drown trying to hold onto you. I must have your love to live. Knowing that it draws me deeper into waters that will eventually drown me, yet I chose to drown rather then live in what would only be darkness to my heart.
I begin to breathe in water. I am now completely submerged. Across the black surface of the water there is a faint breeze and what others would see as light from the stars and the moon but we know it is the light of our love shimmering up to dance on the surface of the water.