Dreams

Last night I had a dream. Even within it, I struggled to find words to describe the vision I had seen.

I find myself in a dark and brooding old-growth forest. Not the bright, yellow-green of deciduous trees in spring, but the deeper blue- or black-green of the spruces, firs and pines of winter. Caught in their spell, I hear the whisper of a thousand voices, a thousand ghosts trapped in their needles and freed by the wind, the ghosts of a thousand trees that feed their young. Gray-dun birds of prey perch in their branches waiting silently to ride the voices and descend on any unsuspecting prey that scurries across the glade.

Beside the lea lies a fieldstone lodge with large, clear windows that reflect the dark sky. A patio of flagstones abuts the field shadowed by ancient sentinels. Who lives within the lodge? Are the raptors their familiars? Do they tend the trees and perfect green? No one is in sight but the place feels welcoming and well-kept. The stones and trees are suffused with peace. The peace you feel on a remote holiday you wish would never end. The peace you feel before you die.

Or wake to clutch a memory and struggle to recapture a perfect, fleeting moment. Like dappled water dancing on the ceiling of a lakeside pavilion. Or the broken reflection of the marshes beside the road that chase you home as you drive. Or two butterflies that spiral up and around each other in a double-helix toward the sky. Or a twilight contrail that transforms itself into a slow-motion meteor as it falls away from the sun. Or the shroud of fog fenced in by the quiet graves of a primitive Baptist cemetery while the rest of the terrain is clear.

All of which makes me wonder, which dreams are real and which are an illusion?


© 2008 Edward P. Morgan III