A Gothic Place

 'I do not know this place,

Though here for long I have run'

I have been brought to this place.  By who I do not know; however I do not think I arrived here by myself. 

  This place is old.  The ground where the church rests upon is ancient, which may account for the familiarity I feel for it.  I do not remember ever coming, or being, here.

'Summer's pleasures they are gone like to visions every one,

And the cloudy days of autumn and of winter cometh on.'

The sun is strong and falls golden over the grass and the graves, through the branches of the trees resting between the shadows.  As I open the decorative gate I see a picture crystallised by light.  Though it is bright my skin is cold and I walk slowly up the path closing the black gate behind me.  All I know, all I know about these steps I take is that I must follow the bright angels; but where have they gone now?  The plants are too green and too pure a colour to be real.  I feel myself living in a dream of an unknown sleeper.  This landscape seems solid enough to walk on but in the edges of my eyes there is a blur of shades.  Just what is happening to me?  I watch myself absorbing this scene and I feel that everything looks perfect.  There is a silence in the sky that not even the birds will break and my voice has evaporated in the serenity.  This beauty's source comes from an unknown yet undying fountain.  The roots of this beauty's fountain run down deep into the earth. They are strong and well nourished.  Beside this my body felt like a wasteland with my muscles as dry as dead wood and my heart as dust.  I felt barren and hard.  I feel that I have lost a thing and in wishing to mourn do not cry.

'I have seen this turning light,

For many a day.

I have not been away

Even in dreams of the night.'

Inside the grey stone of the church the air feels cooler, like the feeling of a weightless breeze, and the light rejuvenates the coloured glass of the stained windows.  This is something old and there is a sense of returning to a different childhood; it is like mine but wholly unlike mine.  This sense of this moment is recurring, it is a sound caught in an echo, eternal but fading in and out of my awareness.  I sat down on an oak pew and my mind caught in the space between the roof and the floor, above the beams, by the arch, I am unravelling my tight knitted bonds and the sensitive flesh recoils in pleasure.  At heart there is a stronger sense of pleasure of what name I have forgotten by remember feeling long ago.

'Moonlight and dew-drenched blossom, and the scent

Of summer gardens; these can bring you all

Those dreams that in the starlight silence fall:

Sweet songs are full of odours.'

I still feel tight inside as something will not let go.  I know that I have been followed by ghosts.  I'm sure that they watch me now.  I am tired from running and all I wish to do now is to lie down and sleep.  I do lie down but t is not nearly as comfortably as I need it to be.  I close my eyes and pretend that I really am drifting off into that place of sleep.  Only I know that I cannot fool myself and so soon I get up with dread and with insomnia of living.  The weight of myself is heavy enough to be not lifted yet also not able to rest properly.  I have been scared for so long now that I am numb to the frightened feeling.  Will this really continue on this way...will it not end...?  I can no longer comfort myself, not even with the thought of death for I know that it will not come for me yet.  I am sure there are ghosts in this place.  They are here somewhere.  I wish that I could see them and talk to them.  They have to hide away from me but not leave me alone.  I am death-in-life.

'I have questioned many a ghost

Far inland in my dreams,

Enquired of fears and shames'

'The dark and winding way

To the day within my day.'