The Open Door

January 2005

Dream Journal

Dreamt I went back to school and I was in algebra class.  Unlike in my other dreams I was actually having fun, thinking I might be able to catch up and not fail the course, when suddenly one of my classmates shouted that someone had a gun.  Everyone started to scream and run.  In the hallway I saw the guy with a gun.  He was from another high school, a football player.  The room we all escaped into had a telephone, but when I dialed 911 they put me on hold.  The football player came into the room and we all ran again, panicking.

Everyone got ahead of me and went outside, in a direction they knew he wouldn’t think to follow.  I was trying to follow but suddenly I couldn’t run at all--it was massive effort to lift my feet.  The football player came outside with another guy and a girl, and they were all laughing together, like they were having fun killing people and scaring us.  I climbed a brick wall and tried to hide in a drainage ditch, but they’d seen me.  As I was climbing the wall the girl took the gun and shot me in the foot.  When I then crouched in the gutter she shot at me again and just missed my stomach.  Somehow I knew I would have died had that bullet been even half an inch closer.

Finally I managed to jump out of the gutter despite my wounded foot.  I ran through a cemetery full of huge holes in the ground, down side streets, even through people’s houses, as I followed signs to a road that I knew would lead me home.  But when I reached the road I looked over, and the girl with the gun was walking alongside me.  She seemed very queer and scary.  Although she wasn’t holding the gun I knew she was still dangerous.  I tried to pacify her with small talk. 

When we reached my house I managed to go down to the basement without her.  Although people were home no one in the house was helping me.  I grabbed the phone in my brother’s room and called the police, but the police wouldn’t let me tell them what was going on.  They just kept blathering on about how they knew the shooting had taken place and they were looking for the suspect.  I couldn’t get a word in edgewise to tell them the suspect was in my house! 

Then all at once the girl was standing in the doorway to my brother’s room. She accused me of calling the police.  I shook my head and tried to say things into the phone that made it sound like I was just having some random phone call.  She obviously didn’t believe me.  In a somber tone, she told me, “Think of all the lives you’re going to ruin.”  

Secrets

Whisper it to me while no one is listening

tell me I am a fool

tell me I am not

tell me something that makes sense

and then prove it

Drowning

Let me tell you what I know about

my broken heart

this is the rhythm of it falling apart

toss the stones in the river because

we are

we are coming up for air again

What did I even know about

guilt and sin

all of the dreams that

I was dying in

it was a curse it was a blessing it

was utter nothingness

until it skidded and came crashing

home

No telling how the earth will

record this disaster

whistling dixie in the wind

as if I had the answer

            ballet with fractured form

tripped up by vengeful rapture

the hammer flung against

the wall

Dismantled piece by piece into

a million parts

buried back with Santa at

the Christmas tree farm

what is dead is what is real to

the falling apart

we heard the siren but not the

alarm

I wonder how I will know when

the sky becomes my master

when dreams of yesterday stop

mocking me with laughter

tomorrow is today tornadoes

circling my trailer

I was wrong over

and over again

Now I whisper to the wind about

my broken heart

failing in slow motion

not a subtle art

toss the stones in the river because

I am

I am here alone at the end

Innocence

With a belligerent expression on his smug entitled face, Adam told me, “I love her."

“I’m sure you do.”

“Why are you so cynical?”

“I think realistic might be more apt," I replied.  I tried to get the bartender's attention, but he ignored me in favor of a trio of giggly college girls.  "You aren't the type to stick around."

“I’ve been with her for almost three years--long before you and her deadbeat father showed up on the scene.”

“I know,” I said, bored now with this conversation.  “Are you going to get the beer, or should I?”

“Dude, you’d better get used to me,” Adam snarled, “because I’m not going anywhere.”

“I guess that’s you volunteering, then,” I answered, and fighting back the urge to punch him, I returned to the table.  “Adam’s getting the beer,” I told Angie.  “He’ll be right back.”

“Great,” she said with a big smile.  But I didn’t care if she thought she loved him.  Soon enough his useless ass would be bouncing straight out the door.

Unprepared

                the place you fell down from

  was the air so pure up there

                                that before you could warn me I

might find you

                  in the rustling of the trees  

you lost your breath

                and I was trapped

             under this avalanche of 

leaves        

                               

Wisdom lost

And nothing is more obvious to
my existence than this raging
internal war,
who is fighting and who is winning,
irrelevant so far.

Misplaced

Dream Journal, February 2, 2005

Had a dream that I went with two people to my grandparents’ house.  The house was empty; we were just checking up on it.  Everyone who lived there had disappeared, except for my grandfather, who we knew had died.  Although the door to the living room was supposed to be closed, a little dog with us ran out of the room and down to the basement.  We went to the basement door and called for the dog.  As he came back up the stairs, a young woman followed him.

Well, I nearly had a heart attack.  She had been one of the missing people we’d assumed was dead--other than that I didn’t know exactly who she was.  I asked her where she’d been. She said she didn’t know, only that she'd been gone for three years.  Whoever had taken her had arranged for her life upon her return.  She had a strange air of contentment about the fact that she’d lost three years of her life.

She told us she intended to stay in the house.  I was scared and I wanted to leave, so she told me to call her whenever I needed her, which didn’t seem very likely.  Other people were staying with her at the house, although I could just see some shadows hovering around her. 

Only then did I realize that everyone who had disappeared were members of my family, not just random people.  Terror overcame me that whoever was taking them would come for me, too, and I didn’t want that.  I didn’t want to disappear and not know what happened to me for such a long stretch of time. 

When I woke up it was the middle of the night and I felt very, very afraid.  I thought to myself that maybe I didn’t want to remember after all.  I didn’t feel so brave anymore.

After that I had another dream.  In it is someone whispered to me, “Be quiet, Megan,” as if they were right in bed next to me.  I woke up with a start.  

Not a good night.