People aren’t afraid of the dark, but rather what is hidden inside. However, Dark decides on what hides inside. Dark holds every child’s deepest fear. The light may try to drown the darkness, but there will always be a shadow. Shadows jump and dance avoiding the light. When we are scared to face our fears we close our eyes and there is Dark looking straight at us. Dark reminds us of what we don’t want to remember. The darkness paints the faces of those we wish to forget on the walls in our heads – it makes it so that we can’t see anything else. Dark sends shivers down our spine by choosing its canvas as our minds. 

Dark is manipulating. Dark distorts reality. What is only just a chair in a corner, Dark takes and molds into whatever it chooses; whatever scares us. Darkness comes when we are already weak. Victim of a broken heart? Meet your new best friend – we call him Dark. The darkness convinces us to stay up late into the night and avoid the light. The light comes with knowledge and joy, but broken people choose to run away from all of that when Dark reaches for their hand and pulls them away. A state of blindness is a state the broken wish to stay. 

A young girl was Dark’s first victim. Just a child. Dark had a taste of the fear it could invoke. After that – hooked. Dark hungered for more. The girl taught the dark about imagination. When left with nothing we go to our mind’s creation. We can imagine the good, but also the bad. And even thinking of good can make us feel bad; it makes us miss what we used to have, or get our hopes up for what we wish to have. And after we are sad and crushed from sitting in darkness, the common next step is staying with Dark, a foolish attempt to feel better or just cry about it alone. Dark relished this and fed off of manipulated emotions, treating them as its own. 

Some have the secret knowledge that they don’t have to serve dark, but can instead make dark serve them. The stars won’t come out without dark, so let the dark on in. Give my eyes a rest to see all the morning light. I’ll need the dark to help me sleep, to help me rest each night. And doesn’t the ocean just sound a bit different, when it’s black and deep and licks the shore. The light makes it glint and gleam all day, but the dark turns it into a mystery, as all we can sense is waves as they snore. Without dark I would never be able to dance under street lights as they make the falling snow glow. Yet the common saying goes… only light can drive out the dark! But why not live in both? With sight and joy and sunsets and light, with dark and stars and movie nights. When let too deep it closes our eyes and controls our minds, so keep the dark at bay. But most people let it in too far, and Dark then chooses to stay…