I Dream My Dreams When I Wake

"For in that sleep of death what dreams may come when we have shuffled off this mortal coil must give us pause."

Last night my sleep was not infested with dreams, but ruled by a single dream.

I walked down a street blanketed in fog. The light from the streetlamps barely cut through to illuminate the ground before me. I could not see if there were buildings around me, but I felt an overwhelming sense of presence on either side, above, and below. Time cared not how fast or how hard I walked; I could not reach the end of the street on my own time. My feet moved as a marionette's, at the mercy of the One holding the strings. At last something materialized in the fog ahead--a ladder made not of rope or cord, but of vines inset with thorns. I knew the world behind the rope ended; the world I had passed through had disappeared with each step. I began to climb.
I very quickly lost my fingers. So pierced, so torn was the flesh that the nerves shut themsleves down and allowed the muscles in my wrist to guide the rest of my hand. My feet were no longer attatched to my legs; I tread the steps of the horrific ladder on bloody stumps that grew shorter with each rung. The raw and exposed nerves caught on the thorns, ripping as my legs continued against their will to ascend to a judgement my mind could not fathom.
When I believed I could go no further, the strings around me slackened and my hands ceased their suicidal trek. The hands that closed around mine must have known that I could go no further. They gripped tight and lifted the rope I clung to until my face was centimeters away from His.
Through the millenia that passed in the single moment our eyes met I saw glimpses of endless worlds. In those eyes that grasped mine in a vice that was a hair's breadth away from crushing my mind, I saw echoes of pain, passion, death. I saw love. But that world that held what I could not have was far from my own. The bridge had been closed. The love was not for me.
As I watched, I felt my soul sliding out through my eyes as smoke flutters from a candle. It was drawn in and lost in His eyes; another trinket to be thrown away. When he had finished, it was as if I had never existed. He still held me in His grip; my body a mere shell; the eyes, once green, colorless and empty; my hair limp and lifeless against the pallid skin of my face. No blood coursed through my veins and yet I lived.
His eyes closed for a brief moment as they swallowed what I used to be. When He opened them again, the other worlds had been replaced by a sadness deep enough to drown creation. He pulled me closer until our noses met and I smelled the universe as it must have been before it was spoken into submission. Our foreheads met and I feared to be lost in the thoughts of one who knew all. His lips parted. Stars fluttered and died in His breath. The moon hid her face from the darkness of His mouth.
All sound ceased in anticipation of His words. He spoke only two.
"You lose."
As the sound of those whispered words washed over me, I felt time become undone. His hands opened and spanned across the sky, blocking out all else. I remained suspended in time and space for a brief moment. I looked in His face, but He had turned away.
I began to fall.
As I fell, I wept for all that was lost. I wept for the pain. I wept for the sadness in His eyes. I wept for the fall.
I wept because I knew I was awake.