I dreamed and in my dream cups broke
And matters where confused.
When I awoke
I smiled an amused
Smile.
For I can not resile
From the view
That dreams oft times represent what is true,
Or at least what may be so
Unless a man say “whoa!”.
If I told you what I dream
You would move the conversation on to the weather
Or any subject but that
Of which I dream.
But why so?
For you know
That every man has his craze,
The secret fire that does blaze within.
Some are driven mad
And are almost glad
To give in
And sin.
I dreamed
And in my dream it seemed
To me that I did look
Upon my book.
It’s back
Did my photograph lack
And what had been
Could no longer be seen.
I dreamed that I was dead.
There was no dread,
Merely a desire
To cross the barbed wire
And escape something or somewhere,
Perhaps despair.
Pressing my hand against the barbed wire, I felt no pain.
No guards came.
I did not cross, for I new I should find
That which I had left behind
– A man locked in his own mind.
I spent the earlier portion of this evening with my old friend Jeff. As ever, our conversation ranged far and wide. One topic on which we dwelt at length revolved around what constitutes reality and how, at any given point we can be certain that what we are experiencing is real. When one dies, my friend remarked, the world ceases to exist. While I don’t wish to get into whether my dear friend is, in fact right, I had in the back of my mind during the entirety of our conversation a poem by A. E. Housman and, on returning home I felt compelled to look it up. The lines run thus:
“Good creatures, do you love your lives
And have you ears for sense?
Here is a knife like other knives,
That cost me eighteen pence.
I need but stick it in my heart
And down will come the sky,
And earth’s foundations will depart
And all you folk will die”.
Kevin
Once, as a child I grasped a thing in dream.
It did seem
That if I held it tight
This object of delight
Could be retained beyond the night.
On awaking, I put away my dream in a drawer
And can find it no more.
Where it did go
I do not know.
Yet I think of it from time to time
And lose myself in rhyme.
Waking early I lie,
Darkness still shrouds the sky.
One day or night I will die,
There will be no more awakening to the sky.
Is death the final sleep,
Through which no dreams creep?
Or a perpetual dream,
wherein our consciousness forever streams?
Often, when dreaming, I believe myself to be awake.
On waking, I realise my mistake.
But how can I be certain the land of sleep is behind,
That I am not in a dream confined?
I lack the wisdom of a divine,
So can not answers find.
The sound of the clock, each tick bringing it a little closer
An owl hoots in the park
A fox barks
Cars pass outside
The bed is warm
Somewhere a couple laugh
Time creeps onwards
I roll over
Sleep envelops,
I dream
Is death one long dream from which we never wake? And, if so would I know the difference between the state of dreaming and that of death?
“They will put the people in cells. Put them to sleep and suck out their brains. They will start with the elderly and disabled then move on to the rest.
The people will feel a sense of freedom when they are asleep but, on waking will have buttons where they once had eyes to operate them. They will feel only a dull headache”.
This was, so far as I am able to remember it the dream from which I awoke some 10 minutes ago. I was listening to a narrator expounding his conspiracy theory? Regarding a take-over of the world by an unnamed group, aliens perhaps?
I don’t believe in conspiracy theories (they have caused much suffering. Witness, for example the Nazi’s mad view that Jews are intent on taking over the globe through the manipulation of the financial markets, which lead the Third Reich to murder at least 6 million innocent people of Jewish origin). I remember, in my dream inwardly questioning why the unnamed entity would want to take over the world and wondering whether I was listening to the ravings of a lunatic.
As pointed out above I do not believe in conspiracies. Given this fact I am at a loss to explain my dream. On going to sleep I have no recollection of pondering on the atrocities of the Hitler regime (“they will start with the disabled and elderly first”) has echoes of the Action T-4 Programme under which people with disabilities where sterilised and/or murdered, the Programme being the precursor to the mass killing, in gas chambers of Jews and other groups, including gypsies deemed undesirable by the regime).
In conclusion I do not know why I dreamed thus. However my dreaming was so vivid that I wished to record it before it vanished in the cold light of day.
An article in today’s Daily Mail (5 November) speculates that within 15 years we may have a machine with the capacity to record dreams.
On the one hand, imagine what new vistas this could offer for authors. With the invention of such a machine writers could take their dreams and construct amazing tales. Indeed some dreams might require no tailoring being perfect examples of ready-made stories.
On the other hand, imagine the possibilities for hackers. Mr Smith has experienced a particularly salacious dream about a lady (not his wife) and Jo Bloggs, a hacker threatens to release the recording to his partner unless a large sum of money is paid by Mr Smith.
Of course the above can be dismissed as so much science fiction. Perhaps it is, perhaps not. For the article please visit http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2821686/Could-soon-record-DREAMS-Headset-uses-brainwaves-viewers-snapshots-subconscious-mind.html
K Morris - Poet 