Last night I met Death in my sleep, a prolonged nightmare, surreal and vibrant. I dreamt that I had terminal cancer, massive and rotting somewhere hidden.

And so intensely I felt the sadness, an immense anger at having life stolen from me, so early.

I sat with my parents, weeping, thinking, "Now I have less than a year to come to terms with everything." Alienation, tangible mortality, a nauseous funeral dirge.

And in a hazy twilight I saw a group of small dragonflies. Letting one land on my finger, I think "Their lives are so short, so fleeting, but they don't care. All I can do is simply live, simply die."

Then I wake up, dazed, startled, relieved, laying for a while in the darkness, staring at nothing. I think about the millions for whom the nightmare is not a dream.

Air has tasted solemnly sweet today.