Dance With Death

Sometimes you don’t ask questions. Sometimes it’s enough to know that where you are now, surrounded by minuscule lights and infinite dark, is where you are meant to be.

Sometimes you take the hand offered, meet their eyes from a mile below, and dance with Death.

You twirl, watch your moon-colored robes swish around your ankles, see your world below shining crystal-clear. This must be a gift, but whether a parting gift from the universe or a welcome from Death themself you cannot know. You can’t remember the last time you saw such beauty.

Are you happy? they ask.

The lights that surround you twinkle. Notes of a song float through the air, quiet but lovely, and for the first time, you feel.

Yes, you answer, but…

Without warning, you find yourself in a field, a marvel of nature and life and wonder, and you are alone. You walk and you walk, and the sky grows angry. It’s miles before you encounter another soul.

The closer you look, the brighter they seem, even the rain beating down on both of you unable to dim their light. Who are you? you wonder. They smile faintly, and you blink, finding yourself once again in Death’s arms, swaying in a never-ending ballet. The soul’s smile remains in your mind, forever trapped by eternity.

Are you content? they ask.

You can no longer be sure. Everything you’ve ever seen flashes before your eyes, a never-ending rainbow blur of a story. Your story. For the second time, you feel.

I don’t know, you respond, and…

Next you know, a jungle builds itself around you as shimmering wings rush by your head. Birdsong high and low colors the air, and you cannot think of anything but the phoenix that rises in your soul and before your eyes. Where is it going? you wonder.

It rises and rises, penetrates the clouds, paints the sky red, turns the clouds to a burning flame. You feel yourself do the same, your soul blending with the droplets in the air and going up, up, up until you find yourself in your moon-colored robes again, drenched in fire and flood waters. The dance is over now, and Death seats themself at a throne 5 miles high.

Are you well? they ask.

You glance at the space around you, the infinite time and glistening pokes of light in the dark canvas you call the sky, and you frown. This is not your place, not anymore. For the last time, you feel.

No, you say, thank you.

And with that you feel snow begin to drift down into your hair as your heaven fades, see a world begin anew and a new life breathed into your body. Who’d have imagined? you think.

Despite the cold air, you feel warmer than ever before.

Sometimes you have to ask questions. Sometimes it’s enough to know that the journey that you take, the ones you meet along the way and the moments you couldn’t have dreamed up are what tell you where you are meant to be.

Sometimes you take the page offered, meet the eyes of the universe from a mile above, and write your own tale.