it had desiderata in it

the last couple of nights i've had weird dreams
about my mother
and i'm not all that anxious to talk family of origin
but i'll try, just a little to describe
some of the themes of the dreams
in one
(content deleted)
sorry can't do it

then, in another one, i was working in an art gallery
this guy came in wanting to buy art for a particular spot
it wasn't home or office, it was a public place, and
that's all the information i could get out of him
did he have a favorite color or something he collected
a theme perhaps that he'd like to pick up with art
dogs and cats and democrats
and a couple of other things
but clearly not anything he really cared about
by the way he rattled them off
so i started looking around
and i found this beautiful calligraphic rendering
of desiderata
with cut away sections
through which there were shadow boxed areas
with natural objects
it was pretty big
maybe four foot long
but narrow
maybe eight inches wide
i thought it was perfect
but he didn't like it
and i showed him some other work
but he didn't like any of it
and i talked to him some more
and he said something
and i clicked
he liked cartoons
do you know about animation cells, i asked him
he did not
i explained that they were actual drawings
used in the production of the cartoon
but that they weren't cheap like posters, or anything
they were actual art, so they could be quite pricey
and there was a gallery nearby that specialized
and he got very excited by the idea that he might
be able to find one of pluto

what does that mean
i have no idea
which is probably why i could write it

and then
i was trying on hats
and someone said: you know
every hat you wear you look different

dream archipelago

there were a lot of bits and pieces
some i don't remember well
some were conversations
some might not seem to fit together
but i will try to represent

i went into one of those little garden sheds
the kind you see done up as studios
behind larger houses
only i was renting this one
or maybe just thinking of renting it
i'm not sure
but
a man i've loved for a long time
came in right behind me
there were small windows 360 degrees around
i was so happy to see him
i hugged him
but i didn't hug him normally
i wrapped my arms around him, then released, then again
trying to memorize the feel of him
from as many different angles as possible
then we kissed
and i'm not sure who started it
but it took me by surprise
and i was briefly irritated with myself
because, with the hugging, i guess i had started, slightly
to salivate and so i was going in wetter than was best
also, since it took me by surprise, i felt
too tentative, all wrong pressure-wise
i was screwing up here
and then
it was like the breakers
and i didn't have any meta-thought left

my alarm went off
i went back to sleep
i kept trying to get back to that
but

i was a reporter
i was researching some religion or secret society
some of this was done on the web
the gathering of background information
these rituals took place on the tops of skyscrapers
uniformly in white fabric tents of a particular type
this type of tent
was also used for hotel-like housing at some resorts
and all that was known about the religious ceremonies
was what had either been witnessed from the outside, or
had been revealed by guests, visitors who were uninitiated
so i knew, for example that their decor favored the smaller
loin type kuba cloths
but not, for example, why
so i was staying at one of these tent resorts
and i liked the tent
but it didn't seem all that secure
so i couldn't leave any of my research there
i had to carry everything with me
and i went to a building that i knew had one of these tents
on the roof, and i tried to pry information about it's use
could i rent it for a party
was it used for employee functions
i got information
but she wasn't telling me the truth
and when i started to walk out a side door suddenly
right by where my car was parked, she stopped me, as though
this door was a safety risk to me, which i thought was odd
until i went outside and found that the side panel
had been removed, the axle disassembled
everything taken from the back of the car
well, i'd call AAA tomorrow, the car could just stay here tonight
i went back to my tent which was close enough to walk
it was dark and a little scary, but i didn't seem to be worried
about my safety back at the resort

then
i think i was in another country
everything seemed a little more primitive than usual
and i was absolutely starving
i opened up a small can
because there were cans of food in the room where i was
but either there wasn't a way to cook food
or i was just too hungry to think about that
and anyway canned food is cooked by definition
i started to eat the contents
and they were the most delicious thing i had ever tasted
if that gives you any idea how hungry i must have been
it was corn kernels with some spice and bits of something
and then i went out to meet my contacts
they were sitting on large carts
clearly meant to be pulled by something
camel maybe
and on the carts there were bricks of something
compressed something in brick form, i mean, not building bricks
there were three carts piled dangerously high with them
and the guy who was speaking for the contacts
took one of the bricks and cut into it to show me the center
and he said: this is the stuff
and it was yellow
and kind of granular
i'm not sure what it was supposed to be
but
it kind of looked like corn meal

transmogrification

the image is fuzzy on this one
there was a long table
i remember that for sure
and there were people working at the table
now, i want to say they were all artisans
but i'm not totally sure about that
some of them might have been scientists
also
i'm not sure if any of them was supposed to be me
or if all of them were
or if i was the one examining their work
i just can't say for sure
and i almost didn't write this dream at all
since it's so sketchy
but
one of the people
the one at the far right end, or stage left i guess
was working with silver
and
not only was she working with silver just generally
but, in the specific, she was working silver icons
and i just remember the circular movement
over and over
to create the halo
and then i woke up
to death in the afternoon
and i wondered
how did i transmogrify
that
into
that

busses and psychos and bunnies, oh my

last night's dream seems less cohesive
so i'm tempted to call it only an amalgam
of the thoughts and ideas that were floating
through my head
except that the thoughts that were floating
were all pretty sexual
and this dream, mostly, isn't, i think

i was travelling on a bus
and a small record company had made a deal
with the bus line to provide live entertainment
so there were these two guys
and, periodically, one or the other would get up
play guitar and sing
which i thought was fun
kind of like the grown up version of
100 bottles of beer on the wall, or
my dog jelly likes to roam
one day jelly left his home
he came back bright and clean
where oh where has jelly been...(etc)
but the rest of the people on the bus
they didn't seem to like it so much
and the bus driver was wearing headphones
playing some kind of classical music, though
i couldn't hear what
and the passengers were angry that the driver
couldn't monitor the crowd, whatever that was supposed to mean
i tried to explain it to the driver, he just ignored them
then we switched drivers at one of the stops
this driver was a girl in her early twenties
who reminded me of juliette lewis in natural born killers
she stopped the bus
she said:
smokers, move to this side, now
ok, ready, lift--
they lifted the side of the bus up like a gull wing door
ok, ready, assume the position--
they all picked up cigarette holders from the ground
and proceeded to smoke
it was bizarre
and when she came back to drive the bus
i told her that it bothered me
and she said:
what, you don't know where your next smoke is coming from
and my hands started to shake
she laughed
a lot
and she'd look around at people in the bus
and the passengers seemed much happier with her
but she made me a little nervous
i was just as glad when we got there
there was up in the mountains
she dropped us off at, well, i guess it was a lodge or something
but i didn't look around inside at all
i just went straight through to the outside
where there were these bridge-like walkways leading down
into a peaceful valley
that wasn't accessible from any other direction
and, as i walked down the walkway
i saw two spotted rabbits
playing in the grass

and we meet the cast and crew

i was in a bookstore
i was talking to a man
i'm not sure if i knew him in the dream
but i don't recognize him awake
he started off listening to me
but then he noticed a door for the office
of a magazine writer or editor (i'm not sure which)
someone of whom he was very much a fan
and gradually he faded closer and closer to the door
until he was actually leaning against it
pressing his ear into the door
now, i figured he was no longer paying any attention
to anything i might have to say
and even if he was
i mean, yuck
so i walked away
i started looking at the magazine rack
and there seemed to be a trend
jewish women were going to great lengths
to try and pass for japanese
this seemed very strange to me
but then i noticed that the door was open
so i went in and introduced myself to the guy
who was so much more interesting as a closed door
than i was in conversation
him i figured i should meet
and we really enjoyed talking to each other
until someone a few seats down made a noise
and i stopped to listen
he's like: what was that
and i'm like: she does a great imitation of the cackle
from h.r. pufnstuf
but it offended him that i had stopped to listen
to someone else
so i excused myself
and went on to the next part of the dream
i walked down a hallway
and i could see into a bedroom
there were people i knew in the dream, quite well
but i don't know in real life
one was a woman on the down slope of fifty
with the kind of piled up hair that isn't popular anymore
the kind you go to the salon to have done
once or twice a week
the other was a little harder to describe
she was 4'11" tall
she was foreign
maybe she was african, but i think she was west indian
she was thin, or at least not one ounce over weight
but there was still something very round about her
her face was very round, and her hair was a short afro
cropped so close to her head that she almost seemed bald
her skin was not very dark, but
rather than being some shade of brown, say cocoa or caramel
she was a lightened blue black
this gave her an almost metallic gray look
but not shiny very flat
but still, not in a way that you'd be tempted to call ashy
and the other woman was busy telling her how
that man would never want her
he could have anybody
who was she
and i had to go in and break it up
i took the gray woman (i wish i knew a name)
outside to tell her how the other woman was just a bigot
and she looked at me and said:
you don't need to worry about me
i know my worth
and then she stretched
and her body became the shape of an X
and lightning struck the ground near her
and she reminded me of storm from the x-men
except the comic, not the movie
halle berry isn't scary enough to be storm, not really
alek wek would have been a much better choice
even if she can't act
storm doesn't talk much
and then we went inside and i got to meet this guy

OMG

imagine kobe with a leontine mane of rasta dreds
he was a chef
and he worked on a yacht called the libation
and he was taking her away with him
i don't know when it happened
but the room was knee deep in water
as he led her away
and you could tell
by the way he looked at her
that just the sight of her
gave him joy

tall drink of, i don't know, liquid candy, basically

my dream last night was a little strange
possibly i had other dreams which i don't remember
but it seemed like the whole time i was sleeping
was taken up with the decoration of beverages
i wasn't working an espresso bar
i am not sure now if i was even making them
but i guess i was
i have no idea how many i might have made
there wasn't like a big pile of them
so maybe it was the same drink
over and over
or maybe
once each one was completed
it was just whisked away
out of the way
of the next production
i'm not sure
there were layers
there was chocolate
there were these beautiful sparkling
maybe some form of rock candy
and shiny chocolate covered espresso beans
it seemed like there should have been cookies
or something
to go with them
but there weren't
until
finally
it was morning
and i was walking downstairs
with a chocolate coffee beverage
that was way to pretty to drink

many layered lotus

this dream was different than any i can remember having
it was more like a meditation
or a received image
i went to bed earlier than i have been
and this dream ended with waking me
at least i think it did
but maybe i dreamed waking
it was that kind of dream

i went to a shop or dispensary or what-have-you
and i bought this thing
now, i'm not sure how to describe this thing
it was sort of a seed pod
but not like anything i've ever seen
it was shaped something like an acorn
but also something like a pine cone
about the size that i could easily hold in one hand
the size of a very small apple maybe
while i used the other hand to peel it
maybe peel is the wrong word
it had this elaborate honeycombed parchment cover
and i was laying on the bed, on my stomach, pulling
the bits of parchment off one at a time
like the little doors on advent calendars
there was a small television playing
some after-school-special version of romeo and juliet
and the dangers of adolescent love
how it ends in death
but somehow that was a good thing
and anyway the television was background noise
and as i pulled the covering away
i could begin to see inside the seed pod
it looked like this stuff i got a couple a times
blueberry i think she called it
with these beautiful little golden hairs
and my entire body started to sort of vibrate
and i wondered
if it was really just with the anticipation of
getting into this pod finally
or if maybe there wasn't something
something in the peeling of it
that was
in itself
arousing

all my brain would let me do last night was make espresso

i walked out into a large semicircular area
it was the back bar area of an espresso cafe
it was too dark to work, for me
so i flipped the light switches in the back
and the whole place lit up like a stage
i walked up to the bar
and i thought: my god, i really miss this
and then a guy walked up to me
started telling me how he wanted it in a real cup
not a paper cup
he didn't know what kind of people
could drink coffee out of paper
but he wasn't one of them
i had real cups
so i'm like: of course sir, i would never give you paper
what is it you'd like
a large cup of thick foam with the shots poured on top
and i thought: that's almost what i drink

then i was at a film festival
there was a director there i particularly liked
we started talking
and i realized i was attracted to him
and that doesn't happen very often
he wanted some espresso
so i went over to the wall unit
some sort of combination coffee dispenser replicator
i had some trouble getting it to make foam
but finally i produced a decent macchiato

duck soup

there was a war
i was at sea
all alone there was a duck
pulling a much bigger bird
it had captured all on it's own
pulling it was going to take forever
so i thought i'd help
what i ended up doing was releasing it
undoing all the duck's work
but then it caught another duck
in a vicious air battle
the sweet little duck ripped the other bird's throat out
but in my mind i called it gored, which might be because
i was listening to death in the afternoon while sleeping
i thanked the duck
and apologized again for losing it's first catch
my duck friend was a true patriot, etc.
and i took the dead duck back to the kitchen
in the kitchen was the smallest oven i've ever seen
it was in the middle of the room like a potbellied stove
but it reminded me of those cast iron stoves
they used to have as toys when i was a kid
except it was bigger than that
and it was blue
robin's egg blue
and some other things might have happened
that i'm forgetting
then i opened the oven
inside there was a cup of coffee
it had been put in to warm
and it had cooked down
until it was thick and concentrated
a thin layer in the bottom of the cup
and i thought
is that good or bad
and i wasn't sure
and there was a duck breast
also in the oven
and i took it out
and i bit into it
it seemed done, but it was slightly bloody
like you'd want in a steak
and i know over cooking is bad for duck
but i couldn't remember how done is done
it's been too long since i've had duck
but i ate it anyway
maybe it would make me sick
maybe it would kill me
probably not
and it seemed really important
to do just that
just then