The skeleton

It’s when the dream passes into his waking hours that he reaches out and grasps. It’s when the dream destroys his distinctions that he clings to the sacred. He believes there are certain things that must not be confused. There’s the sacred and the profane. There’s the dream and waking life. In his skeleton world where mystery degenerates into belief we lift the borders at our peril. In the dream everything is permitted and everything can be dreamed into existence and dreamed away. When we’re awake we come up against the world with every step and have to choose between good and evil. If he didn’t have these ideas he’d confuse dream and reality. The dream would encroach on reality and he wouldn’t know who he was. He’d become like all the others. He’d live in their dream world, where borders are mirages. He doesn’t care if they don’t know who he is, if they don’t care what he believes, all he knows is that if he were like them, if he didn’t believe what he believed, he wouldn’t know who he was. He’d be like them and all would be lost. He’d rather die than live without these ideas, and he’s not afraid to tell anyone. He’ll defend them with his life, because without them his life is nothing — a wisp of a dream, smoke from a candle. And while the rest of the world is reborn again and again he stalks the earth, rattling his hand at passers-by.