Nightmares

Nightmares are dreadful things
They creep into subconscious minds
And tear at sanity's fragile strings
Turning our thoughts to things unkind

I was a teacher of children quite small
And loved the years I spent with them
But soon after leaving teaching, I recall
My bad nightmares started to brim

The sweet ones eyes began to glow
Within my fevered brain so fraught
Red demon light seemed to flow
From every eye that I had taught

Then even stranger thoughts assailed
As each child grew in size
It seemed to me their fingernails
From my body sought a prize

They gouged my eyes and ripped my skin
I could not seem to escape
Although I tried to stop the din
Alas it was too late

Another time a stranger dream
Came to me late one night
It was more dreadful than I had seen
It caused me a sinister fright

I was in my old frame school
Twenty-five students joined me there
But one small boy had broken a rule
And slipped a gun in on a dare

We teachers never checked the hooks
Where all the schoolbags were sorted
We thought them filled with pencils and books
No weapons had ever been reported

But in this dream, he took us hostage
Then brandished the gun about
He placed in front of us a blockage
So not one of us could get out

With all my heart I entreated him
To let one small child go
It seemed that even the room went dim
As he looked at us row by row

At last, he motioned with hands so small
That I should walk one child
Out the door and down the hall
Where children and parents reconciled

So one by one I went with each
Dear student held that day
Until they all had safely reached
And end to their great dismay

Then S.W.A.T. moved right in sync
And whisked that boy away
I never knew what to think
Because suddenly I was awake

I jumped up from my bed undone
And ran frightened with a scream
I grabbed a phone to cal 911
Before I realized it was only a dream

Nightmares can be ever so real
They'll make you do strange eerie things
Nightmares all my dreams seem to steal
I wish they all would just take wings