Trafika Europe 13 - Russian Ballet

A Light in the Night

If it wasn’t for the poles, one here at his side, and the other one further off, he would be just about to lose his mind to the enveloping emptiness. – Listen up, – said Ilya Ilych to himself, – I am taking a nap now, and then we’ll see how things turn out. One can’t go to sleep inside a hallucination, as far as I am aware. Because then it would be a dream, not a hallucination. Indeed, sleep would not come. He couldn’t shake the sinking feeling that the grey fog will pull him under while he lies about sleepy-eyed, and then he won’t be able to escape even into this pathetic existence. Of course, there was also the possibility that one who has earned his sleep eternal may no longer fall into the temporary kind. After languishing for about ten minutes, or perhaps half an eternity, as time did not advance here, Ilya Ilych began to fidget atop the warm nothingness, and sang out, deliberately off-key: – Loll about in sweet slumber, may you dreamof heaven’s wonder!.. Perhaps he is, indeed, in heaven? The surrounding cotton balls do bear some resemblance to clouds, the way he used to imagine them in childhood… Just a little farther, and he might discover some kind of throne with Sabaoth astride it, surrounded by his angels. Although if that was the case they would have dragged him in

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