I drift off to the sound of breaking teeth. By my boot broken As ships on shallow reef. A curse, spit-spoken In half-light, impaired. The Mind crests each swell Amidst violent thrills Then stopping, confused, compares Waking reality to this Psychotidal zone of brackish Dreams; salt-silt. Brain to-the-brim filled With the flotsam of the week And unable to parse sense The Mind gives up all pretense And begs, begs for dreamless sleep. - N.C-J, 2025
However, after reading his article I found myself dwelling on the nature of dreams. Not the aspirational strivings, not the fantasy of day-dreams, but dreams that (perhaps) reveal our unconscious selves. The poem above is, as Kostas would say, a shared dream simply because it is a poem; but it is also a true dream that sailed through my mind in the throes of midnight illness. A very painful infection of the inner-ear which brought about too much of that uncomfortable liminal state between dreams and waking reality.1 Uncomfortable not only because of the confusion but also the violent content of the dream.
I later recalled a passage from Lewis’ Voyage of the Dawn Treader where the ship’s crew has picked up a castaway that begs them to flee the dark land they have entered:
“This is the Island where Dreams come true.”
(The sailors laugh that they have been looking for this place all their lives!)
“Fools!”… “That is the sort of talk that brought me here, and I’d better have been drowned or never born. Do you hear what I say? This is where dreams —dreams, do you understand— come to life, come real. Not daydreams: dreams.
(Momentary, palpable tension before the sailors rush to the oars.)
…For it had taken everyone just that half-minute to remember certain dreams they had had—dreams that make you afraid of going to sleep again— and what it would mean to land on a country where dreams came true.
The only way the intrepid crew escaped the dark and impending horrors of the dream-reality was through a Deus ex Machina in answer to a desperate whispered prayer. Which indeed was also how I got through my own long night of awful throbbing pain and nightmares.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on the poem.
As does much invisible pain that no injury has caused, especially in the head. Earaches are brutal.
That first line is so powerful, Nick, the way it grabs you. And the sounds you carry throughout convey the harshness of the dreaming, the unrest, ending with that final line of begging for dreamless sleep. Great poem.
Enjoyed the dense style and imagery!