The dreams in which I'm dying

Used to be I slept like a cowpat
moist and sticky
with a sickly sweet smell
not much to look at
but soft and warm enough
for barefoot nudges to be guilty pleasures

way back when
I'd hear the same song
playing on the radio
just a little too often
and made singing along
an unnoticed waking ritual

knew every word by heart
but never understood a thing
see, that was way back then
before I woke up sudden
five nights from seven

moist and sticky
air ripe with the tang of old sweat
and eyes jittery in their searching
chest tight and edges blurred
when every calls been answered
and every rib is nudged enough
for a warming glare
I can blink to clear away

the funerals
the memories
the glazed eyes
the lifeless bodies
and convince myself  
for just a little while longer
that dreams are made from fear
not broken figments of cold reality