my pillow was tear-stained (i don't want to die)

i had a dream
last night that
we were

running 

the alarm had rung, the
sky had darkened (or maybe it was still pale blue),
and people were 

yelling

i remember needing to hide. with my
family because
that’s what they told us to do; what we were supposed to do; just hide and it would

all

be

ok

but--

i remember. there wasn't enough room, in that place. (panic, fear, crying idontwanttodie) 

but i searched and found my mother’s gaze, so wild- the kind of an animal in a cage that has found a light- and she drove us, drove fast- the hunter becomes the hunted- 

i remember 
arriving. a stone bunker-building,
old and
solid and

maybe enough—

(it was on a hill. we were on a hill, a beautiful vantage, the kind you would go to to watch the sunset) 

i remember 
opening the car door and
my brother stumbling towards the entrance and
i remember 
glancing to the horizon and 

i remember 

the world going 

white 

(someone yelling, screaming unfairness)

and the smoke mushrooms huge into the sky, 
the 
blue 
sky,

and it is too
late.

i remember

 waiting for the fire to wash over me, to take me at last

and then

i woke up.