Carys Comma

“Wake up, O sleeper,

rise from the dead,

and Christ will shine on you.”

My Daughter,

Why am I telling you this? I am certainly not telling you to wake up. Instead, I am telling you the opposite. Sleep. Sleep, my child, as long as you can. For sleep lasts only so long and then what?

Some years ago, I awoke, startled, and barely recalling a dream. When I awoke, looked around me to find a room so vast that no walls could be seen. The ceiling was low, as if not meant for any person to stand. All around me were cots filled with sleeping people. There were hundreds, thousands... all sleeping.

I crawled around for a while. I tried to wake others up. I tried to make sense of this endless sleeping, this huge place of slumber. But no one wanted to wake up. Nobody wanted to believe that life was anything more than dreams. These sleepers were not happy with me. They kicked me, lashed out at me, and held fast to their sleep and their dreams. I now know why. Here in this Awakening I can see the blessedness of the Dream.

There was a point I even tried to go back to sleep, to recapture the dream. But, it was no use. After a life time of sleep, I can not go back from whence I came, and the Dream is gone as soon as you realize what it really is.

So, now, I wander, in and out of cots, crawling in darkness amongst the satisfied sleepers. If this place has days, then every day I feel no superiority to the sleepers, only regret. I am filled with regret - regret for something I did not do.

I can't help but wonder. Why did I wake up? Why am I forced to be a refugee? I did not choose it, yet I can not undo it. I am forced to listen to the gentle breathing of the Unconscious, and I am filled with a miserable envy.

In the moments after I had first woke up, it seemed to me that the vast room was lit by a distant light. The light was coming from somewhere that I thought was the East. But, that Awakening was long ago. I wonder if such light can only be seen by those who sleep, for it has been long since I saw it last.

Dada