In the Land of Dreams Part 1
I had the dream again.
The city was dying. I had just managed to break loose from what used to be my house and I was screaming the names of my family members. I didn’t know if they were alive. I looked at my hands and I saw how badly they were bloodied from digging myself out of the ground.
All around me I could hear other people shouting for help, they may have been my friends or my neighbors. I didn’t care, I was too busy looking for my family.
Then the ground started to shake and all I could hear were people screaming. The posts around my street were falling one by one and smashing into the rubble of the houses.
I fall to the ground and my scream joins the chorus.
Then I wake up, but the dream isn’t over. I’m in my bed, holding my blanket and I’m being watched. There’s a thing at my feet. Its body was covered with what I guessed were eyes and it was staring at me with all of them.
Every time I had the dream It would just stare at me for a second and I would wake up like nothing ever happened.
This time it’s different.
I still haven’t woken up.
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Written by Karl Gaverza
Copyright © Karl Gaverza
Story inspired by Daligmata descriptions in Songs and Gifts at the Frontier : Person and Exchange in the Agusan Manobo Possession Ritual. Buenconsejo. 2002. & 101 Kagila-gilalas na Nilalang. Samar. 2015.
Watercolor by Tara Singson
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