'If I Could Sleep Forever’

He could feel the warmth of her tender body pressed against his; her silken black hair flowing down to her cheeks. He bends over to remove it from her face and gazes at her beautiful face. Never in his life has he seen such an exceedingly attractive lady. She defines beauty; olive skinned, large pretty eyes, tall and slender physique; he gently reaches out to touch her soft supple lips.

She giggled in her sleep, maybe she is in a beautiful dream. He could see her dimples; how cute she looked. Everything surrounding her is beautiful, content, and filled with love and affection.

He loves her more than anything in this world; she gives him a reason to survive. And she loves him too. She is the one who takes away all the pain from his life, the drudgery and suffering. He lies back on his pillow. He is scared to lose her; doesn’t want to lose the moments he spends with her. If somehow he can freeze the time with her and their eternal love.

He looks back and finds her staring at him; her beautiful charming smile. She bends over caringly. He can feel her warmth. “You haven’t yet slept, what have you been dreaming about?”; and moves over to touch his face. He can feel her care and dedication. “Sleep darling, you have to work tomorrow, it’s already late” and bends over to kiss his cheeks.

The foot lands on his face. He wakes up startled from his dream and finds a fat man shouting at him. He gets another hit on the chest; soon he realized the man is the owner of the cargo ship he works on. “Wake up you scum bag, get your ass on the deck before I throw you out in the ocean”. Grunting at him, the man goes away.

He looks down at his dilapidated condition; his torn clothes barely covering his weak body. He goes to the basement and picks up the heavy boxes and carries it to the deck and does this repeatedly. Again and again. Then he goes to clean the toilet. Repeatedly, again and again. He has lost the count of it. This was his routine. Everything surrounding him in this real world is melancholic and depressing.

Sometimes shuddering in spasm of hunger, he falls down; he is in seizure with no one to help him. His co workers also make fun of him. Though he hardly knows anyone, he is constantly being nagged and bullied by them.

He barely gets anything to eat, surviving on two pieces of bread and cold porridge; and beaten constantly by the supervisors. The only reason he works is because he wants to meet her again; the reason why he is alive and suffering all these torture.

After a hard day's work he goes back to his four feet bed, barely able to stretch himself amongst scores of other men. No sooner is he fast asleep. He sees her beside him; her tender loving look takes away all the hardship of the day. She is caressing his bruises, both corporeal and emotional.

He is in love with life again.

“If I could sleep forever, it is of her I dream.
If I could sleep forever, I could forget about everything.
If I could sleep forever, if I could sleep forever.”

Prashant--

We all need a reason to carry on, because we are never our own reason to carry on. To want to carry on is a gift, but to find the reason to carry on is a bigger gift. May we be all lucky enough to find the reason.

If I could sleep forever... I could sleep forever.

--Hezne