Canto XIII: Black Hole   Imagination’s star can easily supernova and become an inescapable black hole   “Come on, “ I called but she shock her head   “This is as far as I may go.” She adjusted my hood and brushed my cheek “God be with you, for he is here in men’s dreams as in their waking”   Then she turned and was gone like a bubble on a windy day   I strode down the halls sepia-tinged, empty waiting for something though nothing happened   Any monster anything at all would have frightened me less   Then the sobbing started barely audible soft enough to be imagination or reality   “Hello?” I whispered Either I’d find trouble or it would find me either way, I had a purpose.   I tried to follow the sound but I lost the trail   Till I stumbled into nothing at all   Clearly, nothing but a wall soft as cotton But solid as fear   Nothing again Nothing or   In the shadows on the floor lay a twisted shape like the number two scrawled in chicken bones   I looked closely a white nightgown torn slightly, slipping off one shoulder   “No…no…. Joel, you heal-faced monkey get away from me!”   “Bailey?” I whispered “Is that you?”   “No, stop no more imitating Nys, he defeated you Joel…”   “Bailey,” I knelt down “Bailey, it’s me Laura, listen We can get out of here”   “Mary, merchant mob,” she mumbled   “Bailey.” I mustered up my best ‘person-with-authority” voice “Bailey. Listen to me I don’t what’s going on under that crazy-curled mop but listen to me”   “We all breathe fairy tales and live them,” she moaned   I tried to reach through the barrier but failed.   “Laura?” Her palms cupped around something eyes still blinking “Is that you?”   “What’s happening to you?”   “Just--- get me out,” She mumbled. “Get me out”