dreamfoundpoem 1

In light of all the More Important Things To Do in the world right now (and there certainly are), it was affirmed for me this week that the dreamtime still has its role to play. In the personal and in the collective life. My gratitude goes out to Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni for her lovely, lyrical, magical novel "Queen of Dreams", which was just the tale my tired soul needed, in this Here and Now. I was already reading through an old dream-journal from a couple years back, looking for the inspiration and the insights that a little time-remove always brings. This novel gave me the last boost of affirmation to bring a few of my own most beautiful dreams to light. For whatever unnecessary and inexplicable offering they may have to the waking world. The images that dreamjournaling preserves are surely too alive and full of possibility to keep in the dark. Here, then, is a found poem made up of quotes from actual dreams, over about a year's time (and it was a year as transitional as this one, at that...).


forest crying man blue butterfly
looks like a chance of green ahead
we're on the verge of a major breakthrough
air sparks with hope and possibility

cry out! for the deep otherness of this place
this is The House That Saves All The Water
the back of the house is another dimension
it might even open onto the Sea

at the entrance to a building that is the entrance to the city
it is the unending city of Dream, not of waking
behind the colonial government buildings
is an ancient healing spring
he comes to wash, and to make amends to the place

a priest tells me that mass is starting,
and no one can come in with wheels on their feet
I go on my way wearing the symbols of welcome
given me by the other, kinder priest

a woman says, “Prove to me that you're from Texas”
I wonder if one of us is the child, or neither, or both
I do see a few ghosts while I'm there but
convince myself it's only because I expected to see them

searching for parts, odds and ends (wheels)
she sings me a song about how I still have choices
I tell the reluctant man that he'll have to
find and supply his own code, when he's ready

“In my country, we have a saying,” he begins
I hear the power in his voice, and start to hope again

must cross strange waters by narrow gates
to our ancestor's home, to practice claiming our inheritance
1 silent winter month, no water, no speech: as it should be
he radiates joy, serenity, and maybe
a secret I want to know

is my brother one of them, or just the bus driver?
he takes incredible risks and gets away with them
it's my job to be handing people their empty suitcases
we take a sharp left turn into the side of the mountain
and we've arrived

nobody wants to go first, so I do
telekinesis doesn't work: I have to walk back
down the sidewalk to pick up my bag
I left on the road I came in on
I'd like to go back,
but I'm not sure if I know where it is

Late at night, Hakim invites a few of us outside
and teaches us to breathe fire...