THE FIRST TIME I WAS PUT TO SLEEP

The first time I was put to sleep
I remember it oh so well
I went from pain to none at all
To heaven straight from hell
My tormentors suddenly became my friends
We all floated as one in the sky
Looking down on beans and spuds and carrots
My brand new friends and I

It seemed so normal while I was there
Like it happened every day
To float above the street that was next to the field
There was nothing special to say
The balding man he introduced me
To the smiling man in white
Who suddenly floated into view
In front of me from the right

The second time I was put to sleep
The room it went very dark
I closed my eyes then they opened again
The silence was harsh and so stark
They only light that I could see
Was from the window so far away
But the light wouldn't shine into the dark room
I was distant from the bright day

Then to my indifferent eyes
The window became three
In a circle they moved in perfect step
Revolving in front of me
Against the empty silent black
The windows danced and moved
And then without warning at all
I was sitting back in the room

The third time I was put to sleep
I remember nothing at all
I was sleepy before I entered the room
And nothing more I recall
The journey there I remember well
It was the days before you walked
There were striplights and windows and corridors
And then green people who talked and talked

I remember their talking boring me
With nothing I wanted to know
I just felt very sleepy and wanted to sleep
And my thigh had a painful glow
Like some monstrous mosquito bite
It bulged to rounded peak
From whatever they injected before I got here
That made me so sleepy and weak

The fourth time I was put sleep
Was the least exciting of all
A feeling of cold travelling up my arm
There's nothing else to recall
No fields no floating no windows no dark
Not even a drifting before
I went I lay down and cold reached my elbow
Before I remembered no more

I was looking up at the featureless ceiling
Which changed its look in a flash
Then my loved one concerned looked down on me
My bloodied mouth made her face turn to ash
There was pain and discomfort that went unrelieved
By every concoction they gave
My only sincerest wish was return
To the oblivion from where I came

And none of these times was as good as the first
To that dreamfield I yearned to return
And in my attempts to get there myself
There were painful lessons to learn
I was lucky that I was not shamefully exposed
I was lucky I did not die
I learned at a cost that was luckily lower
That I could not return to the sky

But much later on I discovered a place
Both natural and good for the mind
And for an hour or two whenever I wish
I can leave my body behind
Sometimes I go to an alternate place
Sometimes it is simply dark
But the world I come back to is happy and good
Away from the tears of the past

I return more awake than I ever have been
And to a shocking realization
It's in fact them not me who have been put to sleep
All their lives they have never awakened
What they call the real world is only a dream
That lives only inside their minds
So I'm glad for the first time I was put to sleep
Now I'm one of the few who aren't blind

I CAN'T REMEMBER YOUR NAME

I known you now so many years
We've shared jokes and moans and laughs and tears
We've often discussed our hopes and fears
Now I can't remember your name

I know exactly who you are 
Together we have come so far
We've been to many a local bar
But I can't remember your name

Maybe you haven't stirred my soul
Perhaps we don't share a common goal
So now that we are growing old
I can't remember your name

A profound embarrassment churns inside
I use phrases like "old friend of mine"
But the awful truth won't be denied
I can't remember your name

I yearn for how it used to be
When things by themselves came back to me
Now like a ship with no rudder they're lost at sea
And I can't remember your name

I feel the sadness of lost control
Of things I can't do I once did at a stroll
Inside my mind there's a widening hole
So I can't remember your name

I know that you are feeling hurt
Like our friendship's only worthless dirt
But I'd give away my very last shirt
Just to remember your name

THE UNIVERSE

The Universe does not love you
The Universe does not hate you
The Universe will not rush to help you out
And neither will it forsake you

The Universe cannot be summed up
Or its detail fully expanded
In the Universe you are never "home"
But neither are you stranded 

The Universe isn't by your dark sins angered
Nor with prayer and sacrifice placated
Its laws restrict the paths you tread
But you're not down one path fated

The Universe is one of an infinite number
Neither random nor created
You cross many universes every day
Every move leaves others vacated

The Universe is not separate from you
Your skin is not a boundary
You are it and it is you
Call yourself The Universe proudly

The Universe won't show you absolute truth
But neither will it lie
Everything within will cease
But in itself it cannot die

Within it there are endless voids
But none of them are empty
Nothingness does not exist
Each void has quarks aplenty

Galaxies cluster a million per group
As if to feel less lonely
But spacetime spreads them ever further apart
Their weak bonds far from cozy

In fact this continual spreading out
Is happening ever faster
No one can tell us how or why
The Physics we cannot master

Yet all this vastness only exists
Because you can observe it
Without you it would not be here
The observer makes it worth it

And as amazing as this great place is
It's only what your mind has told you
Does really exist all
Or has an amazing lie just sold you?