Digital Rabbit Hole

In honor of scary things in this month of honoring horror and fear and death *smiles, I give you my offering in this category. Natascha took me to a scary sim today in SL called Tim’s Dream It Was scary but I told her later, it made me want to describe my greatest childhood (and adult) nightmare, and then naturally share it. I ran to Kitely and began to carve out this poem you will hear below, into virtuality. I’m hoping to have my world ,”Float” open for any intrepid grid hoppers to stop by on Halloween. I want to make this poem, come to life, and all who visit will get a taste of what horrors our own imaginations can conjure up if we are floating in an ocean in the dark. I composed this strange piece, which reminded me of perhaps what large stalking fish might play if they were circling around before their dinnertime. I encourage all of you to click on the hyperlink in bold called “Afloat” to listen to me recite it to this odd music. It’s an mp3 file you can just stream in your browser or feel free to download…and Enjoy! The photos were taken on Kitely – Virtual Worlds on Demand  on “Float” I hope you will come take the experience on Halloween. (I hope I finish it by then too:)

“…and there are the nightmares that float you, and put you out to sea.”

Please listen to the mp3 file of the poem recited to my original music written for it.
Click this link: “Afloat” by Karima Hoisan.mp3

“Your legs drag in the water like lures, but you don’t move,
for fear it might be your last.”

Afloat

There are nightmares that chase you, or trap you and enclose you inside,
and there are the nightmares that float you, and put you out to sea.
In the middle… in the middle of the ocean, beneath a moonless midnight sky,
a million stars too far away to save you.. you just float in dark insecurity

What could be under you, or what’s that sound, and what attaches to that fin that’s going around?
Are you the main course of a feeding- frenzy that below you, now begins to organize?
And what’s the little splash, and that silvery light that just streaked passed?
Your legs drag in the water like lures, but you don’t move, for fear it might be your last.

Helpless… you are helpless and there is no where to go to feel safe.
And the water is getting colder and the night is blacker than it was an hour ago,
and your imagination models every tentacle and tooth, until you begin to feel them and know, the brushing past your calves and ripping ‘n snapping at the leather of your soles.

No where and no one and nothing you can see above or below… but you’re not alone.
And the water ripples, and now and then something comes up hard and bumps your boat.
You’re trying to stay calm as you talk yourself down, praying you’ ll still be here by the dawn, 
as one -thousand cold blooded eyes, watch you fear-filled & paralyzed,
bobbing on the surface afloat.

Karima Hoisan
Oct. 18, 2012
“Float” Kitely – Virtual Worlds on Demand