Tonight I would like to lie asleep and think and dream of Airstrip One.
This room is small and dark, cold and hard, but if I can but think of her I will transcend the glum confines.
It's my turn to ask what the love thing is all about?
I heard one bleeding from rape brought in last night. I'd forgotten until now.
A poem for the age they'd wanted over in the past, which is a separate land according to...oh...I forget now who!?
The mind is slipping a lot of late, which is down to my habits. But I won't admit that even to myself.
On my stroll this morning I found I was pondering the possibility that second-hand clothing could be of third or fourth-hand origin (hell, even fifth-hand!).
Like I said, I'd like to lie dreaming of that great land. Sometimes I envisage the land as a lady, reclining with grace and allure, on a celestial chaise longue (but that's neither here nor there, a mere aside, so quickly back to the matter at hand).
I'm cancelling the plans I had to write to dear Shrew (who must still be written to!), for, tonight, time is given over to dreams.
I'll leave a little light on for fear of the dark. Remove my spectacles for comfort. Say a few small prayers (will they ever be answered?). Then I'm supine, feeling quite fine. If I had a camera phone could I take a picture of this dream?
((Dream 1
Why there you are and you're laughing too. And that was life by the railway tracks and then your daddy died. To get away from all that, you appear in dreams by my side.))
Has this been dreamt before? How it feels to be there at the moment of death, on a scale from your goldfish to your actuary?
All that trouble that brewed and blew up over Jerusalem and all that smoke down in Mesopotamia. This little death seems so tiny in the scheme, yet I feel its pain sharper than that raped prisoner's scream. What a racket they made of it and the sun had just gone down!
Only received an answer this minute. I'm told the technology does not yet exist to photograph my dream.
But I will persist, by dint of pen or keyboard, to recall it and record it. Along with all teh oters that clutter up my brain, enticing me down time tunnels (and I haven't even mentioned the nightmares which have bowed me into submission, starved me, scorned and spat upon me and left me mingling among my race with no desire to look anyone in the face).
((Dream 2
I awoke on a paradise island (doesn't everybody?). Over the dunes they paraded: identikit blondes bringing babies in baskets from teh boudoir to teh doctor's base by the infinite shore. To my right, I then noticed, the columns of cadavers in caskets waiting to be shipped out!)).
((Dream 3
My name is Cyril Hennessy. Born AD 2003. I'm heading into a shop to have my hair cut. It's a nice day out and the length of my locks has brought too much heat to my head. The barber is a zealous Elvis Presley fan. The shop's adorned/cluttered with much memorabilia. The man starts to cut and does a nice job, shedding my tresses. Everything is pleasant. At a certain point, to maintain the amiable air, I mention a current book. And, without thinking, concur with its depiction of the King's "mother fixation". The cutter cannot take my comment. I am ousted from the shop, forbidden to return. My name is Cyril Hennessy. I'm walking around with a half-finished haircut on my head.))
Many worlds have passed me by (or is that vice versa?). I'm into my ninetieth-thousandth birth. Many castles of sand have disappeared. Many more are on the verge of vanishing.
Sitting by this table of cake, strewn with coffee cups, sugar (heck, there's even a decorative ashtray), I just gaze across and think: do others besides me possess the means to affect a breezy cheerfulness in their talking, with only despair in their minds? And is this laughing man before me leading a double life, bawling each night, flushed and broken, towards daybreak?
Then I stopped thinking such things. As mentioned, my mind is slipping. All's loud in the east as life on Earth continues apace. Will report again later.
©Brian Ahern 2003
Comments
Post a Comment