Aphelion Issue 301, Volume 28
December 2024 / January 2025
 
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Hello Darkness My Old Friend

by Alexis Child


When you awaken from a nightmare, covered in beaded drops of sweat like the squalid stench of death, gasping for breath, your legs unable to carry you when you arise from your bed… And, when you are alone with your deepest, darkest fears and anxieties… And, the screaming sound of sirens are in the distance, getting closer, eerie sounds of sirens approach like something out of a Stephen King novel as you realize you are one step closer to the grave… And, you run and hide as the ghosts ask: "Did you dream of me last night?"

When it is daylight, the screaming sounds of sirens wail while you are working and when you need some peace and quiet to preserve your sanity… And, when the sound of sirens comes like death as a spider crawling towards you from their web… like Dracula, you left your keys in your coffin.

When there is no escape, resistance is futile… Yet, the sound of sirens approaches… Perhaps a slight case of mood poisoning? Must be from something you hate… And now, you may be bloody and cry all the time from the arsenic lacing your frosted flakes… Perhaps, a true trauma queen badly needing attention from all your bleeding… And, you may hear voices, those magic pixies in your head telling you to do stuff… And, have a therapist who is the least favorite of all your personalities as she cannot help you with your mind.

When you finally have a guy who is funny and spontaneous… Yet, he taps on your window uninvited at night dressed as a clown… And, it's all screams and sirens. When you think you're releasing aliens from their cells in Area 51 and screaming sirens are going off instead. When you hit the send button on your computer for what could be the biggest journey of your life. Ooops. Wrong button.

When the light at the end of the tunnel has truly been turned off, Code 3… And, emergency light and siren for the Siren Queen.

Hello darkness, my old friend… the sound of sirens.


© 2022 Alexis Child

Alexis Child hails from Toronto, Canada; home to dreams and nightmares. Alexis is a former Social Service Worker, befriending the demons that roam freely amongst her writings. Alexis once lived with a Calico-cat child sleuthing all that went bump in the night and is haunted by the memory of her cat. She has had a small measure of underground success with her gothic rock and darkwave bands in the past. Besides having rare mystical experiences she hopes are not just short circuits in the brain, she writes dark poetry while starving in the garret with her muse. A starving child is a frightful sight. A starving vampire is even worse. Please donate non-perishable food items and B-negative blood (and make it a double!).

Alexis' fiction has been featured in Danse Macabre, Schlock, Screams of Terror, and U.K.'s Dark of Night Magazine. Her poetry has been featured in numerous online and print publications, including Aphelion, Black Petals, Blood Moon Rising, The Horror Zine, ParABnormal Magazine, The Sirens Call and elsewhere. Her first collection of poetry, Devil in the Clock, a dark and sinister slice of the macabre, is available on Amazon. Alexis' second collection of poetry is now available on Amazon and from Cyberwit Publishing.

Visit her website:http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/alexischild/ and her YouTube Channel:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg6S5u4yX73kA1ZWGnKaEBA/videos

Find more by Alexis Child in the Author Index.

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