I'm awake, but not really alert. Anything could snatch me, the ruling or the folly. Uncontrollable drifting. And I'm painting, painting for Goya. Thinking of the dark trails winding off the Earth and twisting, bending swiftly into innumerable corners, drifting into a sleep of reason deeper than the surface, perfect in the benign indifference of the picture, straying from harsh human thought. I'm following, following a light trying to make out the depths in the shadows before me. Trying not to slip into them. Trying not to let them consume me, break my bones, cut my ankles, my shins, Achilles. I'm listening, listening carefully to my feet crunching under me, not knowing the surfaces they are touching but the fantastic mind produces the image based off sound bites over years of memory. Still, the unknown shadows jump out at me. Will I fall off the edge of the mighty force that shot itself from the crusts years before I dared stroke her spine. Is this the reference of the ageless time I let pass between me and the rest of the world. I can't breath, but I'll climb with rusty muscles to this rocky corridor and take in the impending light. Even then, I won't crumple. And still, scraping the edges of these great cliffs at the close, eyes glazed staring out the train's window, I can feel the home of this winter cold. I can feel the warmth in these impoverished homes. I can feel the rise and fall of the lungs of the animals in the pastures. I can feel the almost frozen soil in its gentle rolling nature over these mountains, giving these courageous people the food they have earned. And when I watch the sun fall over the valleys of this diverse and absolute place, turning to purples in the mountains and reds over the rolling crops, I feel this sense of calm rush over my eyes and in my heart, everything is functioning just fine.