Sleeper of Hypnagog - Lantern

On through the sleeper’s lair…

This vestibule of bones

The dream-like lion’s den

His serpentine abode

A way one only fares

At lucidity’s end

And the death of comprehension —

The sleeper’s time of wake

A convict of coercing silence

Trapped I am, inside these bowels rendered dead and timeless

Gatekeeper: how long must my shade still lengthen?

«Ceaselessly… until thou findst redemption at His altar»

Pledge thy vow… without retreating thy glance

Kneel and bow… with purest obeisance

In the dead of the night… succumb to the cult

By the killer’s sight… thy blood is bound to halt

Absorbed by that which calls me, voicelessly

The dread that lies beyond what my eyes can see…

Restlessly, like waiting for an axe

To take a swing and chop my head off

I squirm and tremble

Is this where I shall witness my last?

Is this the way my days are bound to pass away;

In despair and solemnly aghast?

A black chime airs, paving way for an ungodly mass

The hour drawing nigh, I feel it in my bones

It’s calling me inside… the nightmare’s heart and soul

To doze the violent dreams in the sleeper’s stead —

The predator unchained from its depths

My path leads on through honeycombed flesh corridors

My vanquished soul in this living death’s undertow;

In desolation, my ashen lips in an averse moan

I lay down on a stone with bloodstains

…My eyes 'come heavier

And into the night my struggling fades

My bane in this ritual deep inside my brain

A whisper the knife that cuts the weak bonds

Of rapture and pure agony

…The lion roars