Back under the cluster of maples as the lake
Rose with snowmelt in the afternoon sun:
What does an animal without language think
On waking from a vivid dream? One doubts
There's a vocabulary for relief, much less
An equivalent for "whew, just a dream."
Then again, many humans with languages
Would never have thought "just a dream"
Either. Message, prophecy, revelation come
Down the royal road from the unconscious,
Visitation from a lost relative, another world,
Any of those. Still, they require language
To imagine, don't they? Body thought this
After another intimate encounter with water.
Floating in distorted light was a way
Of dreaming while remaining awake.
If there were no way of parsing a dream
As a narrative, a message, a haunting, or
Whatever language could explain, then what
Would be the experience of waking
From the middle of one? The light on waves,
Which would be to say, the waves on waves,
Wove a fine shawl around those questions.
You were dreaming when you gave them
Your name, son, but they don't know when
You're gone, when coming after them.
It's not what you remembered. It's a weapon.
The language you use is its whetstone.
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