• I usually don't dream. When I sleep, it's a black void of rest that envelops me entirely, and leaves me in serene darkness until I wake once again. When I do dream, it's never clear enough to remember more than a few glimpses. It feels like chasing wisps of smoke into a thick fog. One night though, I had a dream that I'll always remember, because that night I know in my heart and soul that I saw paradise. I will write of this dream now, while I remember, and I don't blame you if you don't believe. You had to see it to believe.

    It began with me walking in the dark. I had no idea where I was, or where I was going, but I knew I was being led there. I could hear a faint sound, like the distant lapping of waves as one nears the coastal beaches, but...more meaningful. More deliberate. I found myself slowly emerging out of the dark, and I was on a forest path with golden trees. The leaves seemed to be made of gemstones of various colours, yet I knew that these were no earthly jewels from their glow. Inside them danced a hundred little lights that only just barely glinted through in the mist. I saw myself, for the first time, and I was naked. I did not stop walking, and I felt such peace that I paid little attention to the golden trees, and their gemstone leaves, and even my own nudity. I proceeded down the path until I came to a clearing with a spring that fed a creek that led further into the golden forest. Here I saw my reflection, and over my shoulder in that reflection I saw the face of my regrets. He looked like me, but...tired, ashen and distraught. I felt sorrow for him, and for a moment my face matched his, and I then realized that this was to wallow in self pity, and I felt dirty. I knelt near the water and touched it, wincing and forcing myself into the spring. I felt all my sorrow and all my pain wash out of me, a thousand memories of agony swept away by the power of those heavenly waters. What had at first burned now soothed and invigorated me, and I felt truly clean as I was washed down into the creek.

    I surfaced as I regained awareness, the water itself lifting me back to a standing position in a most gentle way. I knew I was now in the center of this forest and I saw a great tree of purest white that stretched up higher than all the other trees in yet another, larger clearing atop a small hill. A woman was sitting naked there, and I could tell she was my soulmate. She smiled at me though I couldn't make out the details of her face. All I knew in that moment was that she was perfect in every possible way, and she had been waiting for me. I was filled with joy and we embraced. I begged her to let me stay with her here in this beautiful place where my worldly concerns were gone. To let me sit and walk with her through this golden forest for eternity. To let me live with her here on the hill with the white tree eating it's fruit. She sighed, stroked my face, and said I couldn't yet. I knew I had to find my own way, but I had to ask her anyway. She smiled at me and put a finger to my lips. Then I heard it, and saw it.

    The mist had quickly begun to seep into the tree, peeling back from a deep night sky filled with countless stars that all seemed so close. A tapestry of lights they formed in the sky, which was now so impossibly clear that I could not be certain there even was a sky. As I watched I heard a hymn rise from the tree itself from tones inaudible to mankind into my own range of hearing which seemed heightened. The stars, in their infinite light and colour, began to coalesce in the sky, swirling together in circles until they formed a mass of stars so bright that it brought back the daylight. While this transpired, I heard the tree's song rise to such deafening volume that the forest air became alive with the tingle of music, and yet none of this was too much. The stars then came down as one dancing mass to sit atop the tree and it grew quieter as the stars themselves joined the hymn with a million shrill voices all in flawless harmony. Then the song grew fainter, and fainter, until it turned to a whisper. The whispering light continued to dance, and now individual stars came down to join us as man-shaped light. We danced and raised our own song in thanks and in prayer. The golden trees themselves joined our dance, moving in impossible ways for trees to move to dance with us until the entire forest was alive with celebration, with each leaf adding a different note to the cosmic symphony of our united song. We tired after a time, and I knew it was time for me to leave, but my love and the light-men bade me wait and pointed to the whispering light.

    It spoke to me. I heard my name as though spoken by a true friend I had direly hoped to reunite with. I wept at the sound. This was too much, this voice. It spoke again and I ceased to weep. I don't remember what it said next, but I know it told me how to get back there. My vision began to fade to darkness again, but before the golden trees and my love and my friends made of light faded, the whispering light spoke one last time. It said that I would find my way back, and that nothing could change that.