The empty feeling starts in my shoulders, steamrolls the length of my back bone and down into my feet.

Straining to stand on solid ground, my shoes kick holes in the air, the feet of a hanged man, desperate and panicked.

I lift off and soar into the sky, over the tops of buildings like Superman, arms outstretched; the buildings rustic Grandma Moses barns, brown and black- painted cows grazing on glowing LSD-green grass, whinnying horses corralled in the splintered, faded-gray wood pens.

I bank and dodge the pointed, lime-green Christmas trees trying to spear me on their sharp tips. In the branches, small brown nests, threads from a sweater woven into them, a pink clot of nestlings chirping for their next meal. Drifting in and out of the clouds, I reach over to touch one and close my hand around a cool, wet nothing.

My stomach folds in on itself with excitement and I pick up speed, putting my arms out to slow myself down as I glide to a stop, gently, gracefully...and then go into a nose-dive.

I plummet through the air and jack-knife into the ground like a lawn dart, my arms thrashing and stiffening to protect my head, my eyesight suddenly a 'Blue Velvet' x-ray. I pass serrated blades of grass, dirt and shit-encrusted beetles, fat earthworms crawling through a maze of buried dog toys, the thick grasping roots of trees and into the brittle, rotten arms of the long-dead and long-forgotten, who welcome me with grimy, maggoty grins on what's left of their faces.

As their lips touch mine, I burst open into a white shower of static and wake up, my heart pounding, my breathing ragged and racing.

I take a moment to look around my room, confused and lost. I can't see anything except the shadowy outlines of my furniture and the glowing red letters of my alarm clock.