She Dreams

               A maiden sleeps. Wizened, pale yet fair. Her hair like black and silver silk and eyes of richest blue, she lay in deepest stillness sitting in a chair of curling wood and green upholstery. By the last light of a flickering candle flame. It burns so bright, that the fine oaken table beneath shines with a certain glimmer. A glimmer of a feeling, long lost. It dims as a window is suddenly opened by frigid winter stirrings. The world becomes darkened, deep in its sorrow. And in the new birthed shadows It's eyes burn bright. All life fades from the candle. Only the moon's pale haze pervades the darkness as Winter's howl surges, an unseen haunt in the night. It's majesty falls over the maiden, as the moon is swallowed by the sky. 

     Suddenly, the candle lights anew as if touched by some unseen hand. Its rapid ignition falls  upon once hidden litter. The fire roars to life with fierce hunger, wild and angry, in a way the candle could only imagine.  She awakes, her eyes looking upon the book laying open in her lap. It's pages laughing up at her for time lost. Lost for that which is now rendered meaningless, for she had always sat waiting. 

     The maws of Death open at last for the maid, so wise in her years and so alone . It ferries her down a river that is frozen yet boiling, like hot springs in winter. Tall black gates of obsidian luster rise before her, as the freezing tides fall. Slowly, oh so slowly, they open. Beautiful in their grandeur, but terrifying all the same. The Princes beckon her through their gates of iron and might. Terrified is the Maid, but determined to be finally free of the torments of Life's shackles. Rage and understanding floods through her. That which was once her love would never return, her life lived in time frozen by hope. 

     Standing before the gates, a sudden and pleasant surprise greets her ears.  Could it be? A miracle instead of the screaming of tortured, and the howling from depraved beasts? There on the gentle breeze were songs, oh so sweet and delicate. Songs of golden life, and silvery hope. The darkness that she had seen was not that of this glorious place, but of her own making. All her misfortune and her wrongs and misadventures danced within her mind. Now she would see the truth that lay beyond the veil. For in this place of alabaster light, it was here. Here on the other side waiting. What was meant to be the fire of love and life fulfilled, but frozen in time was here.