Drafted In The Dark

I can’t sleep.
My dreams are never friendly.
Sometimes they drag me back to a single moment of the past
other times they hand me an alternate timeline
where life turned out kinder.
Either way, they’re dreams not worth having—
yet my subconscious forces the door open,
makes me watch every mistake I made,
every message I missed.
I sit with the ones I lost.
But it’s different now.
They know they’re gone.
They know their presence is killing me.
Still they stay—
night after night they come back,
just to tell me something
they never say.
A message never sent, only drafted
in the dark folds of my brain.
My mind knows the truth:
it’s my words for them,
never theirs for me.
I can’t read it.
I wake in sorrow and heavy sadness,
instant regret for opening my eyes—
because I lose them all over again.
Why can’t I not dream?
Just black before dawn.
Just silence until the light betrays me.