Dream Gallery

I am about to eat an entire bag of candy. It is alright, its the week of the dead. calories and indegestion are hand in pencil cramped hand. There is something stirring about academia on this week. I feel manically happy and then like my gut is about to be ripped out. its so much dread, then a joker laugh.

But it cannot be helped, dear reader, the times you get inspired. and even though it is seethingly inconvient, and i often have said inspiration when i also have three post-its full of tasks to complete, it is worth it to my indulgent, rippling self to scribe a few paragraphs worth.

ahem, ahem..... perhaps be paitent with me here, tonight.

I have a dream about this girl.

She is a beautiful woman. She is blindingly lovely some days. Sometimes you want to hold her face with your teeth so you have a piece of it. of beauty. but you couldnt bite down, you couldnt think of a taste. You'd just hold her perfect head in your insignificant jaws and it would be a great gift.

I have often felt unreal when in her presence. sometimes i fiercely want to be cradeled in her comforts, worn thinly inside a tshirt. have a telephone without her on the other end, tell it explicitly how much i am in awe, in passion, in disgusted reverance. walk side by side with a real live fence inbetween us, so i could feel a physical barrier. Throw a ball and a hankerchief over. Watch the spectacle. Be in love, and on a fence.

She is a talanted painter. she picks up the oils and smears them expertely. i see my jaw, a fist. i see the most beloved parts of myself, shinier and newer. She hangs them up and draws upon them perfectly. She shows your friends the gallery. You are so beloved, it says. They didnt know you were such a multifaceted person. i love you, i love you i love you i love you

She is a dream

In my dream she is also muted. It is not sudden, it is almost expected. You are coldly beautiful now. She opens her mouth and snakes and cockaroaches spill out. Multitudes. They are brown and the same looking, they wriggle and fly around dejectedly. On the other side of the fence, the grass is greener. she steps to the right and a purple flower blooms. a wasp twitches on its petals.

The gallery is on fire. Her paintings are intact, miraculously, but my face is charred. The canvas is there, but its image distorted. i pulled one off the wall, with fumbling and impossible motions tried to restore it. But it was just dust. i had to leave the others to burn.

This time i ran back to the fence. I scream to her, terrified. She looks at me, standing straight as a pole, her body magnificent and pale, upright on emerald grass. To her left, the flower is dead. Her clothes look stupid. Her hands are palms forward. In my dream i see her, guts out, heart halved, limbs askew; neck breaking, back bent, souless, nothing new. It is a war scene. It is the most terrifying thing i can picture. a branded child, fingerless Johnny, voodoo dolls, poison ivy, infant coffins, blue eyed Pecola..... But Again i see her as i really see her: pale, sturdy and alive, still-faced. Milky white, tears leave her eyes like the betrayal they are to her, but have never been to me. i can only watch them hit the ground. i can only watch her hair being pulled by the wind. each strand gets it own gust, flutters subtely, before it rests. even in muted horror, the quiet absolute terror of home, she is beautiful.

I go back to the gallery, exhausted. I forget about the snakes and remember a flower, her smile, her hands. i lay down on the floor and cover myself with the ashy remnants of what used to be my face. I sleep for as long as i can bear to.

I dont know how long she stands on the other side of the fence. When i wake up she is painting above me, and my friends are rebuilding the gallery. She looks down and smiles like i have brought her great happiness. Above the racket i can hear the wasps humming.