Flight

Flying is a favored subject of my dreams, having appeared with mesmerizing frequency throughout the course of my life's sleep. In many dreams I've been on airplanes. Usually airplanes out of control, certain to crash. But the strange thing is…it's always quiet. No roaring engines, no unbridled screams of panic. Maybe just the wind. A light hissing. I'm never the one flying these airplanes. I'm always just a nameless passenger waiting for impact, terrified. But as far as I know, I never die.
 
In other dreams, my own body takes flight. If I flap my arms hard enough, I actually leave the earth. It is usually to escape some danger, like a charging wild animal or a madman with a gun. But I never get really high. Never spy the authentic curves of the planet. And my flight is awkward and exhausting, never with the effortless grace of birds. If I stop flapping my arms, I do not glide, I fall.
 
And I always wake before I hit the ground.