I awake floating down the river towards the barreling maw of the sea and look up the sunny green hillside to see the rundown palace perched up on high. The great old structure, once an orphanage for the damned, is being bombarded by the hellfire of the State. Squatters, they say – it’s private property, after all. No matter. I have to get out of the river.

I crawl up the rotting concrete staircase with one hand on the rusted railing and the other on my aching head. I throw up saltwater as I collapse onto the sidewalk next to the memorial to the ancient explorer. The words of the oracle reemerge: participate, participate, participate.

Just then, my friend the explosionist is walking by with his dog. He invites me for a coffee. Squeezing water out of my hair and laden by my heavy clothes, I say sure. We stroll leisurely to the nearest cafe.

We pass by the public information display, which normally shows the weather. Today, a different message scrolls across:

A better world is not possible. Do not believe the agitators. Protect what you have!

We walk into the cafe, but no one is behind the bar. I had gotten along well with the bartender, who was always so kind to me. But it seems he has been returned to his home country.

We walk behind the bar and make ourselves coffee. I leave a trail of water in my wake, a memory of the sea. Yes, the sea – that was part of it. While drifting down the river, I dreamed that I was in a wrestling ring. The crowd was roaring, the match broadcast on intergalactic frequencies – live! I was eager, jumping, ready to go, swiping at ghosts. Then, silence – my opponent entered the stage. I gazed in fear and disbelief. It was the Lord God himself.

But that was just a waterlogged dream, after all. Reality stares me straight in the face as I sip that sweet morning coffee. It is not the Lord against whom I must struggle, but the sea.

– How goes work in the explosives factory?
– Went up in smoke. Now I’m taking a break.
– And the dole?
– I have an appointment to submit my plea next year.

The explosionist grabs a sandwich from behind the bar and starts feeding it to his dog. I can’t stop thinking about the palace. They had been the first to accept me, an outsider. It was there, at the winter solstice, that I had chocolate and chestnuts, after which I had nights filled with dreams for the first time in years.

Dreams! Another power slain by modernity. Dismissed as irrational or dissected as pathological. Forgive us, unreality, for our blasphemy. If I stay illogical long enough, maybe I can string together enough dreams to believe in something.

The explosionist and I chatter on as he feeds his dog the sandwich. He takes the occasional bite himself. We talk about chaos and collapse, but I’m not listening. I’m staring at the river. It drifts by and whispers: time isn’t real. I wish I didn’t keep forgetting.

The wind changes, perhaps the air pressure drops. I’m not sure. Something shifts. I rise abruptly. Blessings upon you, I say to the man and his dog. I am called elsewhere.

I climb through the cobbled streets of the old town. The vines grow over the worn stones. They used to be cut every week, but nowadays they encounter less resistance. Soon, I hope, they shall make a final advance and put an end to this folly.

Huffing and puffing, I circle the yew tree and stumble past the cars. The bells chime twelve times. Surely it must be noon, I think to myself. But why not midnight?

I duck under the caution tape and squeeze through the gate to enter the dark canopy surrounding the palace. How long ago was it that I learned the language of trees? Today, they are afraid.

Approaching the door, I hop over the police barricade and dodge a blast of hellfire. The friendly lawman with the fire-cannon bleats into the sound-device:

A better world is not possible. Do not believe the agitators. Abandon the premises!

I slip in through the front door, or maybe the garden window. Space has been shifty around the palace ever since the trees remembered their names.

The palace is ornate, decaying, proud, ancient. I suppose it was built by the hands of men, but it has since become a project shared by many more. Paint is spilled across the worn black-and-white tiles of the floor. The walls are alive with portals to other worlds, born as art and empowered by time. The flowers sprouting from the plaster call to me: Let’s occupy!

The squatters are on war footing. Their hands drip with paint. They are making art, frenzied, desperate, gleeful. A manic charm is in the air. A glob of hellfire crashes through the window and scorches a mural. No one notices.

I climb up to the next floor. I see the girl named by the stars, dancing. A room of people dancing. Yes, there is one moon – and the other? I rush to the window, and sure enough, it gleams from just above the hill across the river. Brother Moon, Sister Moon – can you, at least, help us? Do not be silent now, when so much is at stake…

I leave the dancers in peace to sing to the moon. I work through the labyrinth and take the hidden staircase. I knock at the corner door and it swings open in its leisurely way. There stands the artisan, tears in his eyes.

– Arm yourself, child of the sun. The palace is under siege.
– I cannot be violent, dear craftsman. What do you wield?

The artisan gestures about wildly. His workshop is full of creation: sculptures, set pieces, puppets. Discarded cardboard drifts across the floor. Percussion music beats in the background.

– Culture, child! Sing to them of what could be!

But it’s no use. I left my voice behind in the river. By now, it’ll have floated to the sea. I look out through the window, through the garden, to the wide bay beyond. Where is it, great sea? Will you return to me my dreaded tongue?

I stumble out of the workshop as the artisan returns to his task. A towering puppet takes form: a dragon of expression, a flower grown through the cracks. The unarmed champion of those from below.

A cat crosses my path as I climb another floor. Farther from the fray, the light starts to slow down, and I see things more clearly. I hear the books in the library muttering to each other, curious. The branches lean down from the old trees to listen. The walls tell of joys they’ve seen. There were the concerts, the solstices, the readings, the workshops, the rehearsals, the dances, the feasts, the festivals, building, destroying, creating, imagining, and – dare I say it? is it allowed to be thought? – dreaming, dreaming, dreaming…

On the next floor, the film critics patiently sit through a screening, hoping to finish in time. Wafting up from below are the notes of a band practicing. In the workshop around the corner, the carpenter nails planks into barricades. Climbing above, I see sparks flying out of the production studio, the finishing touches being scorched into the episodes. Looking down to the courtyard, people are running in from the garden, arms full of vegetables. I can’t tell if time is slowing down or speeding up, but it’s definitely not staying still.

At last, I reach the rooftop terrace. Ceiling of heaven! At the base of the hill, the river, the bay, and the sea unfurl beneath me. The wind brushes the rough blue surface as sunlight shimmers across it. I look upon the nameless force of water which I can’t help but worship.

And just like that, time stops. The police are frozen below, fire-cannons ready to burst. The dancers are caught mid-lunge. The carpenter holds his hammer high, the artisan his chisel close. Drops of paint are suspended in the air of the cacophonous entryway.

I feel a rupture within, and suddenly I am split in two. One half is thrust forward into the unknown. The palace is conquered, and in its place rise opulent apartments. The state attempts to solve our problems with violence, and the people relearn the vanity of authority. Oil is exhausted and floods and firestorms and the wrath of the sea cleanse our sins. Seeds rise from the ashes and a new world blooms, blessed by forgetfulness.

The other half is carried backward across the unbreachable gap. The police vanish, the palace is restored to its founding glory. The iron returns to the ground, manufacturing is unlearned. The forests regrow and the beasts return and the stars, the radiant stars, are crystal clear in the cold night sky and I remember what else we are allowed to hope for against the coming darkness. Back I go, farther and faster, time dissolves around me. Until again there is the lonely child in the forest, reading of distant lands and dreaming of other worlds.

And the two halves reach the point where the circle closes, where the past and future haunt each other and braid together and surge forward and catch me and throw me and I emerge back on the terrace, tumbling down the singed facade of the collapsing palace, the music of that old quartet dancing on my tongue: Only through time time is conquered.

Dazed and confused, I stand before the assembled invaders. Them with weapons drawn, me dripping still with the salty drops of the sea. The sea! Now, please, when I can be silent no longer –

The pigs ready the fire-cannons and take aim at me. The moment hurries towards completion. Time is running out, as perhaps it always was. There, on the precipice, as the vase tumbles off the edge and the flowers are threatened with the cold void of irretrievability, there, when the darkness descends to swallow our dreams and forever circumscribe what we may imagine, there, when music vanishes from the face of the earth and we are left with nothing but clocks and cables and bars and chains –

There, the sea gives me back my voice. And I raise my hand, begging for just a moment, and say:

– I arrived mute, and now you hear me speak. I came empty-handed, and now my palms overflow. I long ago lost my dreams, and now they have returned. Do not fear the wicked, for we wield the power of banishment. Do not fear death, for there are no stories outside of time. Do not fear the sun, for it never seeks to deceive. Even when all has been taken from us, we will still have the word. Even though you have chosen the path of violence, you retain the power to listen. In this world, we are enemies. In the next, we shall be friends.

The soldiers gaze at me, bewildered. I stumble by their drifting eyes and through the old gate as the agents of power resume their barrage. I start back towards home along the path of the ancient pilgrims, who sought the bones of saints. None to be found around here, alas, for their names have been forgotten.

Yet I go astray on the old saints’ way for I walk in the wrong direction. The guiding arrows are unseeable to me. So I slink, and trot, and make my way through the paths that invite my step. I come across the statue of the man thinking with his heart. I stop to look at the gaping hollow in the stone figure’s chest. Through the cavity, I see the steel factory below.

Again I feel as though I am wrenched awake, but now only by instinct. I thank the trees standing dimly-lit by the night torches. I thank the soft rain pattering through winter’s empty branches. I thank the cold earth eager to burst into life. I thank the clouds, the wind, the sky, the sun and moon and stars. I thank the river and the sea. And I thank the creatures bound to our fate as friends begging to save us from ourselves.

The better world: to ask is the height of unseriousness. But I know it is possible because I have seen it. I have lived it. The wicked cannot deceive us. The path of degradation will not loosen that gleaming memory of what was, what is, what could be.

Again I find myself sitting by the river, singing softly to the aching night. Ritual, spellcasting, the word in the desert. These are powers we wield, yet they fail us in this time of need. Spoke the prophet from the fourth quartet: next year’s words await another voice. The voice shall be ours, surely. Yet the machine mocks our songs of hope. Can language redeem the absence which remains? The river is silent. As always, we can only try.

Yes, participate, that was the word. But what is left unsaid?