[Newspoetry] Dealing with the stuff of dreams...

[DL Emerick]

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http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2006/01/23/news/body_mind/news938.t
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Dealing with the stuff of dreams...
 
I dreamt, again, last night.
 
My standard fare, really. 
You, or rather "of you" --
how I must be thinking of you,
down at some deeper level,
than day-dreams that I direct,
deeper in the dank caverns,
where flash light may come,
but never illuminates soul.
 
In this dream, I got a note,
from you, in just a few words,
emailed, typed in cold type,
saying "Come on up and see me,
this afternoon after work... Janie."
 
Nothing much more said.
I had been wanting to drive up,
that serpentine way of asphalt,
winding between wooded hills,
where pines stand dark green,
past slopes made barren by fire,
but I have resisted the urge,
feeling it would be rude,
or intense my sadder mood.
 
So, in drama of dream,
I did --or started out,
but, in the next instant,
I was there in your home,
the door was standing open,
as if in an invitation,
but no one was there,
your vehicle was gone.
 
As I walked into the room,
lamps -- floor ones -- many --
one by one began to fall over,
crashing in sparks their lights,
eerily, sporadically.
I recalled some trove of bulbs,
you had hidden down the hall,
went and fetched a box of them,
and replaced the bulbs,
set the lamps upright again.
 
I sat in the big stuffed chair,
and waited a moment or two,
heard thudding sounds outside,
steps on the porch and then
there was you...
           and someone else...
 
A seven foot giant, yours,
balding slightly at the top,
whiskered, and mustached
and smiling the way idiots do,
as if he could understand me,
challenge me, to speak to him.
 
You brushed past me,
without saying, "Hello DL,
or other words of greeting,
as if I were not even there.
 
Silence was supreme,
dust danced in the air,
as I could hear you two,
murmuring, down the hall,
Lord knows as I do, too,
the explanation empty,
without any reason to it,
just the whim of a woman.
 
Feeling out of spirit, place,
I decide to leave and let go,
but can not leave impolitely,
without my saying goodbye,
to my host who was no host,
who could, would not explain
her trumped invitation plain,
as if my pain were nothing.
 
I gazed upon you, Janie,
your visage, at your pout,
as if I should accept it,
while your lips said it,
"This is Don... he's my guy..."
"What happened to Cowboy,
to Sam, to James?" I mumble.
"I don't know" you said,
trailing the "o"s out long,
as if such plaintive tones
were to say regret for you,
asking but unapologetically;
ever now wise to your fears,
could you convince my ears,
to tell my heart "forgive her"?
 
The giant reaches down,
half dragging me down the hall,
outside and releases me.
I reach up and poke him,
in the bare V of his chest,
where his shirt hangs open;
actually, it's more of a thump,
as I say to him, sharply,
"Do that ever again to me
and you have 5 seconds to live..."
 
He looks me evenly in my eyes,
for he is standing off the porch,
and my eyes are level with his --
and he says, "Don't come here,
don't come between Janie and me,
and don't ever talk to her; leave."
 
I hear a chirpy voice calling me,
and find that the giant has gone,
indeed, the whole scene is gone,
just the pines are present, shushing,
and a young bird, with curly hair,
is standing there before me,
standing enormously there,
for it is about five feet long,
and somehow I know this bird,
that it is a young eaglet,
and its bald eagle parents
are soaring in the blue skies,
now and then visible,
through the fringes of pine
that border the edges of sky.
 
They call down to me,
"Take her, this our eaglet,
to town, to get her hair cut."
 
Scene replaces scene, abruptly,
for dreams never fade their views,
but jump as if the camera were off,
in moments that never happen
between the scarring scenes.
 
I'm sitting in a chair, waiting,
in an old style barber shop,
and my eaglet is being cut,
the barber is like a man,
but like a crow, as well,
with mixed features...
sometimes having a beak,
sometimes a mouth,
sometimes feathers,
sometimes clothes,
and so it goes,
amorphously,
with nothing explaining
the fluidity of the features,
as if it were all so natural.
 
The barber says "Done, next"
and whisks the white drape away.
Chirpy still sits in the chair,
I walk over, to see the top of her head,
a few hairs lying fuzzily about,
as if a lawnmower had a bad blade
when it crawled over the grass.
 
I reach and scratch the fuzzy head,
scruffy like a patchy beard,
like a place on you I once touched.
My own hair, for I am next, is long
Four foot long, hanging down me,
in long strands, like those of Cousin Itz,
and it's all the darkest black color,
as I notice this the barber speaks, saying
"You look quite the mountain, man."
 
I sit down and response to his inquiry,
"Give me a close cropped crew cut,"
but he then protests no knowledge,
of what a crew cut style is --
so I say, "Do it like you did Chirpy,"
he does and I find myself relieved,
of the long hair dragging me down,
like Absalom, held down to die.
 
Scene four.  The walls of the shop
simply vanish, but the shop stays...
on the edge of a large parking lot.
I walk over to where Chirpy is talking
and see lying near her feet --
and they are bird legs, pipe stems,
just like your limbs are thin pipes --
and a pipe mouthpiece on the ground,
a briarwood thing, expensive.
 
I pick it up, concerned for its loss,
for its owner will surely miss it.
Over in another corner of the lot,
some folding chairs are being set,
in arcs, around a platform podium,
where sound equipment is being set,
and a small electric organ sits.
 
A couple of burly guys are there,
looking for all the world
like Pat "Make-my-pay" Robertson,
or any other of those silk-clad,
silk-tongued liars and deceivers
of the Bible Beater Belt,
bent Jesuslander leaders,
of ignorant Pond Hollows,
snakes crawling on the earthy.
 
I dumbly ask if they are losers,
of this nice pipe mouthpiece,
they say no, but give it to us,
we may find the owner here.
Reluctantly, I hand it to them,
and roam back toward the shop,
still standing in the open air.
 
As I step toward the shop,
a man steps toward me,
a grizzled gray-haired guy,
like Gandalf or Gabby Hayes.
He asks after the pipe stem,
and I point over to the rabble
of religion that has gathered,
down there, hysteria in action,
singing hymns as if God listens
to such rackets and wailings.
 
He moves away determinately,
and accosts the street minstrel,
in a break of, or in a break in,
between the smooth word songs,
and asks loudly, defiantly,
for the return of his pipe stem.
An angry conversation ensued,
but I woke, sad and confused.
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