Fishing in the Dark

A series of seven dream poems.

I. at a park beneath the moving shades of the oak trees we found ourselves

together caught in the glow of midday when you pulled out a book

and handed it to me with a shimmer in your eyes and a quirk to your grin

I opened the bound pages and scanned the text only to find words

of a girl you wrote about in a story you hoped I would read

beneath the layers of paper and letters I felt the heat that rose

higher and hotter with each passing moment and I knew then

that it was not from the sun beaming down on the book in my palms

your book in my palms, like the sides of your face I wished to grasp

and read your eyes and plunge into the deep story they hid

never to leave the bound pages you had written myself into

but instead, I wrapped my arms around you, feeling your embrace

surrounding me in all its warmth and wishing it never to fade

like a burning light in the darkest of night where the cool winds blow harsh

against the side of our flaming candle, flickering but never blown away

I awoke to wonder if the heat was all imagined, if

you were the warm oasis of the cool bed I found myself in

shivering within the sheets alone, but without loneliness,

for the dream of your touch still lingered beneath my skin

and I could only pray to dream it again and again

and again, so as to keep our flame alight in spite of the days

that often feel darker than the night with its burning stars

flickering above our beds

 

II.  I fell into the night to find a swarm of people crammed inside

the house, friends and family: the familiar

faces all blurred across the scene like paint smeared across the canvas

I wandered through the crowd only to find you

with another girl, giggling and smiling in your presence

before you two became tangled in each other's lip

and tongue, which I held to the roof of my mouth, wanting to shout

your name and whisper it in your ear all at once, wishing it was me

you had your arm around, and in the thrumming of the bass of the band

and the chatter of the crowd neither of you saw me

standing there watching you both fall into each other as I fell

backwards, pushed by the weight of my pounding heart

against the water of tears, creating more splash than ripple

ripping at the seams of the fabric I held myself in and caved

running to the back of the house and out the door in a jealous surge

of force that pushed me out into the night and onto the cold

wet grass as I opened my eyes to find that dawn had just arrived

 

III. it was a quick moment like a memory just whisking

on by without a sound or a definite location: a lost embrace

was all I had to cling to in the morning light, fading

from sight, I tried to catch it�"a feather, a bubble

a butterfly carried away in the wind of the daylight

and laying next to me was someone else and yet

I was someone else, too, and since that morning I have yet

to find myself stuck to the ground

 

IV. out of bad habit and fear I let myself slip

back into the hands of him in a dreamand you were the witness to my crime of robbery

and fraud, for you knew what I was stealing from myself

and who I was kidding and for that

you both pitied and hated me; even I pitied and hated me

raging a storm inside my chest as you walked away

in silence, letting your eyes speak the volumes

your mouth couldn't confess to me or to him, and then

it all hit me: this was exactly what I had done before

outside of this dream, but I was free now, free to breathe again

and free to do my own confessing of which you already knew

about but would never be the judge

V.  we were traveling somewhere, anywhere but here

leaving with no destination in mind, no plans

nothing but the road to drive us and we let it

drive us, for we had grown tired of walking in circles

in mazes of roads and avenues getting caught

in the neon glow of streetlamps and bars

begging us to come drink from the fountain

but we were hoping to get drunk off the warm tongues

of each other instead of the cold lips of the glass

it was deeper than that, deeper than the tissue

or the pulsing muscles bounding beneath our skin

or the cells streaming between the heart and the brain

until we couldn't tell where the fluttering wings really flew

inside us and they were neither just a part of you

or a part of me, but what made us

us: my head on your chest

falling asleep as I'd never done with anyone before

dreaming within a dream, and your lips to my forehead

opened my eyes to wander through the day until

each dream, each poem began to bleed

 

VI.  into the next and I couldn't seem to dam the stream

that flows down the page like water over stone

one moment we were tumbling down the water-

fall, the next we had washed ashore on a bench of sand

and we talked without words, just sounds and skin

and I began to wonder if we knew too much

or not enough, as I ran my fingers softly through strands

of your hair, knowing and not knowing all at once

everything we saw and felt and hoped for

right in front of us, we watched the fisherman

on the dock reel in their catch as the sun rose

and you pulled me in closer to your scent of saltwater

and your warmth like a memory I never knew

I had forgotten to remember

 

VII. unlucky dream number seven

came and went faster than the disappearing act

of number three and I felt defeated

losing to memory loss, so I looked

to the empty side of my bed

and wondered, is it always going to be this way

just a dream�"I can't accept that conclusion

on my own, at least not yet

 

what if

dreams are frosted glass

in which I can see the shapes and shadows

of you, and you of me, blurred

vision as we reach forward

hands on both sides of the pane

because we each want to know

that this is more than two-

dimensional delusions

that this is the one

place where we meet in the middle

but will we ever reach beyond the wall?

 

what if

dreams are sand sifters

filtering through the shifting grains at night

to find the shards of broken glass

and cracked plastic washed ashore

only to then throw them out�"

my nightly routine during low tide

a bad habit of the heart, or maybe

it's become an addiction I've accustomed to

craving the high of the sea-

weeds caught in the constant crashing

and breaking of the waves

before finally being let loose

to dry and whither in the heat of day