People will criticize your dreams,

Layer doubt and uncertainty on your consciousness

Because they don’t understand

The intensity and ferocity of your fire,

With its red passion,

Aggressively orange desire,

And burning yellow optimism,

Your fire, your eternal, internal warmth,

With its propensity to spread, to expand.

They’ll approach the ladder you’re steadily climbing

And insist you’ve missed a rung or two,

As if you haven’t reached a higher altitude already.

They’ll warn of the dangers that lay above you

Without regarding the successful resilience of your past

Or the Houdini-style escapes you’ve scraped your way through.

“You can’t marry the mood,” they’ll chime,

Thinking they’re ringing out like virtuous bells of truth.

But if I can’t marry the moon,

Explain to me why I’ve been bathed gloriously in its light

Why it’s soothed my dubiety,

Quelled my ever-questioning mind.

Explain why it’s kissed me goodnight

After I’ve collapsed into a cocoon of blankets and pillows,

Exhausted from the efforts I’ve left behind,

Whispering in my ear that the sun is going to rise again soon,

Powering the winds of renewal

Like my perfectly-paced, everlasting forward motion.