[Poem] Splintered Nights

My house collapses, then vanishes completely;
A hitherto undiscovered room
materializes, giving joy.
A friendly ghost wanders across darkened rooms
A loved face gets close then disappears.
A whiff of happiness, I smile.

A baby cries fearing the lofty swing of the sling in a tree.
Frantic running up and down a stairway
pointless;
I sprint across fields of corn and sunflower,
then chased by a man who freezes into a scarecrow,
Scythe in hand, I wake up,
panting.

The sun beats down on me
lying motionless in the desert sand;
A loved one, long dead,
Comes to the rescue.
In stormy seas, in a capsizing boat,
next flying to safety in a hang gliding float.
Standing silhouetted at a precipice,
a long fall to wakening.


I live many lives, I paint other lives,
All within one night,
Enactments in a mind scape                                     

                                                                                   

night after night-
not for me the wait of many births.
Events of waking life,
re-lived as I will - them.
Arguments lost are now won.
Fears surface, regrets too
tears fall and it is safe to cry.
I pen amazing songs,
Think up fantastic plots
Only, they are lost in waking.

Innumerable incidents,
half remembered snatches
of events dismembered,
Reassigned outcomes.
My sleep life more exciting,
made
more intriguing
by the boredom of waking.