I howled last night while dreaming!

Highly excited about this dreaming experience.

Regular readers (thank you!) probably have noticed howl much I dig using [howl] in my writing. I say it in my daily life as well. I bellow it, in silence, at night. (You have to be quiet it the flat where I stay, see.)

I have lucid dreamed since being a young child. I realize I am dreaming quite quickly in the dream state.

Sometimes this realization empowers me to change the dream consciously. Sometimes, I realize I am dreaming but do not realize I may be able to alter the dream state. (But, howl. Why change a new experience for what you assume would be better? The idea does not occur unless I feel real suffering.)

Many times, dreams feel like another plane of reality upon which I have landed, where, the best I can do, upon realizing I am dreaming, is to choose to try to wake myself up.

I am overly familiar with the sensation of sleep paralysis. Of becoming mentally conscious before being able to move my body. It is a weird feeling, but I have never felt the terror others describe when experiencing the sensation. No aliens. No demons. Just a simple inconvenience.

“Oh, howl. I gotta sit here and think, ‘wiggle your big toe. wiggle your big toe,’ ” for what seems like an eternity.

Eventually, my big toe actually wiggles.

Enough context.

Here is the dream.

⊙

I stand at the top of several flights of stairs.

Wooden floors.

An old, antebellum-style home.

Southern gothic.

Crown molding with runners.

There are no lights and

“It was a rainy night.”

A strike of lightning flashes. I see a very, strangely, white child appear on a bench, below. Situated upon the first landing, one flight of stairs, below.

Right before the stairs cut around to the next segment of their spiral.

He looks up, directly at me.

His eyes go wide.

Yawning like mouths.

Too wide.

I do not want to be here. It hurts more than it needs to.

Instead of thinking: wiggle your big toe,

I say, softly,: howl.

I know that I am dreaming. I cannot change the dream.

I want to wake up.

I start bellowing out:

HOOOOOWL.

Lightning strikes again. It illuminates the same bench.

Now, there are ten more children, with yawning eyes, where there had previously been only one.

I howl myself awake.

Serendipitously, “howl” took over and took care of me.

Joni Mitchell – Help Me (1974)

No rights: homage to a lady champion.

From

All I Want (alpha) to

All I Want (beta) to

Carey back to

Conversation forward to

Wild Things Run Fast to

Smokin’ (Empty Try Another) back to the impeccable

The Last Time I Saw Richard and forward to

Coyote, and

.Blue Motel Room.

JM knows, knew, experienced a lifetime of love and lust

and was gracious enough to share.

She knew interesting folk, if you look into it.

Still/s

And,

still,

I howl.

What is this extraneous energy I feel coursing inside me?

Whose is it?

I need some wing-wo/man to deal with the secrets

people impart to the queen of magnets.

You said: she get it from her momma?

I said: eff right off.

{Not you, doll.

You look fine.

I love your snarl.

You are fine;

yet, I, still, worry you run cold.

I don’t get cold.}

I don’t exist in orgiastic ecstasy.

I exist in an ecstasy of sincerity that happens to be orgiastic.

And, yes, it seems like an eternity.

{An eternity for which I am already too late.}

Last Open Table: Trade Secret Talk

Hey Aimme, I only have table 18 open…: I say, hostessing.

Oh, the four top, newly remodeled to a three?: she says, jokingly but without a smile.

~

{trans: yeah, that guy that joined table 19, without a word, stole the fourth chair from table 18 and has blocked access to table 18.

/Some men appear to need to take up an unnecessary amount of space. The cunt in me thinks they are the same men who feel compelled to drive large trucks with flat beds they will never use/

Additionally, the small dining room of this restaurant is filled with only tables for two and tables for four. This makes table 18 a hot commodity to a hostess. Especially, a patient, thoughtful one working Sunday morning.

But, push has come to shove. I won’t run a waitlist for him, this joiner, unless my server says she thinks they deserve it.}

/some posers know how to tip/

~

[She should have been cut an hour ago.

We should have dropped to two servers already; but the gal closing told her: yeah, we could cut you if I wanted to work harder.

I overheard this. It disappointed; but, there may be reasons such a statement is more reasonable than it may sound to my ears.]

⊙

Am I cleared by you to do my thing with this guy: I ask?

She nods immediately. It is louder than words to my ears.

I wonder if she noticed I kept seating her out of rotation, when a table in her section became available. I made sure she did not lose a table because of the joiner.

I don’t mention this.

⊙

A table for three arrives.

One moment: I say, wearing a smile, for them alone, that says “I’m gonna let you in on a trade secret.”

I take two steps over to table 19 and begin with

a big, genuine (“here goes no-thing”) smile

{In a way it is my job to do so. /You see, hosti are notoriously flighty. /otherwise they’d be servers, right?/ giggle}

I say: hey there!

[I do panto, panto, panto, then a little soft shoe.]

{Sic. Hosti trade secret}

The entire family at table 19 laughs.

Me and the five year old are now waltzing in a tiny square.

The people standing, waiting, start laughing,

for a different reason.

We should get out of your hair: says the dad at table 19.

{This family had finished eating over an hour ago. We call such folk [campers].}

Well, I do need to get access to that table over there, to seat these fine folk: I say, motioning to actual humans waiting.

Table 19 kindly slide themselves aside while making small talk with the family I am about to seat at table 18.

I am now waiting on the waiting list.

The best kind of professional inconvenience, to me.

⊙

Table 19 leaves.

Table 18 is seated.

Thank you: says Aimme.

I am immediately and acutely overwhelmed by deja-vu.

I grab Aimme by the arm and say: I just got the most intense deja-vu I’ve felt in years.

Because, I experience the feeling not infrequently.

Because, Aimme is empathic, too.

Because, it feels so strong it calls into question scales of magnitude.

She stops.

You must be in the right place: she says before springing back into action.

…

I dig the gravity of her spontaneous response.

Over her shoulder, she calls out: thank you for making sure I got as many tables as the others.

Formalizing metaphysical, higher-level education

Prof. Lewis: what is the meaning of life?

Carroll: to answer the question, “what is the meaning of life?” Is that right?

Chuck raises his hand and is acknowledged; he asks: will this be on the quiz?

Tight Lungs

I saw your raven’s claw hit the mark too squarely.

The clip of the talon’s clasp.

Snatching telephone cable as I watch three lightning storms

consume the sound.

Thunder.

I do not buy nonchalance

anymore than I am willing to eat soft words when

my eyes go hard.

Uncanny does not always equal canny.

Ariadne now knows how to lucid dream.

A hand poised, around a throat from which

“take my breath away” is whispered with

an accompanying half grin.

Physicsical Moaning

I smile: I am pleased you like the work, but not particularly interested in why.

You liked how it felt.

Instead, tell me about the last dream you had while sleeping?

Did you like how it made you feel?

⊙

I dreamt a record store called All ‘N Analog. It was no analogue.

And,

What if it turned out that Paul Revere was just a Boy who cried Wolf?

Let’s incorporate.

A stem [becomes]

steAm.
Repetition of action is

not repeating oneself;

though, care must be taken, of course, so you

don’t repeat yourself;

but, sometimes I love it when

you repeat yourself

(or ask me questions, the answers to which you believe you already know.)

⊙

Self-awareness of ignorance can nearly

overcome it.
Just don’t over-commit.

You will, still, scratch that itching nose with a finger, whether you are aware you do so,

or not.

⊙

You skate on a bead of water produced from the ice you melted as the blade of your skate skirted over it.

You have not cut the ice.

Boiling point is dependent upon the local atmospheric pressure, sweet thing.

Are you at an elevation of simple sea level?

The triple point of water.

A bathtub producing water, ice, and steAm from its faucet head.

All states

existing simultaneously; and, at the same time,

the ultraviolet exposure at my atmospheric level, fries, while I watched the sun rise

from my spectacular, secularly sacred space.

Flying in Formation

The dissonance of a consciousness can be caused by a lack of cultural consonance.

A flock of birds makes daily, coordinated flight shows,

training the little birds,

the ones I watched learn to fly over the last week.

The seven others will make tight, sharp barrell rolls,

reversing their momentum and direction.

The three babes miss the sign

and lose their flock.

I see the panic in the way their wings change their flapping.

The hip, bone game: Joe Tex – Show Me

No rights: homage to the coolest mafahcking front man that I have seen.

Seriously, he dances with his mic stand better than professional ballroom dancers move with their partner/s.

I love a man’s hip bone and I like to play:

The hipbone is connected to the….

/tell me that you gotta show me/

Forgive the pronouns if you can and dig the essence.

The beat tricks me. It seems a half count slower than my ears expect.

Tension of time.

Intension.

Sonic Youth – Bull In The Heather (Official Video)

No rights: homage to a band I have saved like gelato for rainy days.

i.e. a band I knew I would dig based on who else I have and do dig, for the last fifteen years.

[Do you ever save bands like me?]

I listen to music like folks watch t.v.

Too much.

Parzival research leads me to new words, ideas, preferences, everyday.

This song I found about two weeks ago.

It suits the proclivity of all, across the spectrums, so far as I can tell from my limited perspective.

/tell me that you gotta show me/.

Does everyone not endear an invitation to agree or disagree, with impunity?

Half a morning.

The obelisk is well-balanced.

Soujurn is a relative term.

The smell of salt rolls off the Sound into my mouth and nostrils.

The slight humidity makes the smell reminiscent of a locker room.

The water is sweaty like hot skin.

Addled.

Pyre-amid Dream

I dreamt I was not quite a teenager.

I fed ducks in a park on a bench, with a Holocaust survivor. He was a mean man, and we got along well.

We did two things:

1. Feed ducks bread crumbs

2. Play a game.

Starting with A, we would name diseases/ailments in alphabetical order all the way to Z(ed).

Alzheimer’s

Bunyons.

Canker sores.

But, repeating was unacceptable.

Ex. Next round:

Acne

Boss eyes

Cataracts.

He always won. I did not care.

He taught me what floaters were but could not tell me why sometimes I saw white ones, like the sprinkles of 4th of July sparklers, and sometimes I saw indigo ones.

He only saw the white ones.

⊙

But, before that,

in the same dream,

I dreamt that

the crest of your wave foams white in its churning.

My c-heeks go red.

Eyebrows arch up high as your brow furrows.

You slide softly and I run nails over your rib cage.

I kiss your nape.

⊙

But, before that,

in the same dream,

I dreamt that

I went on a walk.

My arm swung by my side like the pendulum of a grandfather clock.

Wafting leaf smoke like incense in some ceremony.

I heard two staccato strikes against strings of an amplified guitar,

in time with my heels’ clicks.

Witness UK – Scars

No rights: homage to a song that re-entered my mind a week ago.

I heard it on a College Musical Journal monthly compilation compact disc when I was about 16.

It took me a solid seven days of racking my brain for lyrics.

They finally appeared this morning, over coffee, to my mind’s eye, enabling me to locate this song.

Finally.

Labouring in Unkind Kindness.

A day I play like Cool Hand Luke.

If you labo(u)r, you probably do not have Labor Day off.

You are probably extra busy with your labor, in fact,

because of all those non-physical labourers who do have the day off.

No judgement, just observation derived from experience as someone who has been on both sides.

This is pure assumption: I can tell if you have ever worked on your feet, by how you interact with me when I am running a waiting list for the restaurant.

Open secret x: I am the hostess. I want you happy.

Open secret x’: you will not piss me off nor will I say anything unkind.

You know why?

Because, nothing pisses cranky people off more than someone who will not take your anger bait.

Killing you with kindness quite literally, you silly folks.

This is where the Tao of Cool Hand Luke comes into play.

You trying to put me down on the ground?

I just keeping getting back up with a giggle and a smile.

I have been through far worse.

I can do it until you are uncomfortable.

Every now and then, I can even make you smile.

Score.

I appear daft. Too stupid to realize I am being insulted.

I appear sugary sweet, but I speak in a calm, deep, resonant voice.

Just so you get a grip on the power of my gravity.

Unkindly kind.

The benefits of walking the block

I decide I need a tab, as they say.

American Spirit: ingredients: water and tobacco.

And some kind of paper, right?: I wonder.

The point is moot as I have already inhaled the combustion of fire to leaf.

Why are you smoking when all you really want is to be walking, Little Wing?: the No-One man asks me.

Because I need to clear my mind and grease the wheel. So, I can count to ten.
Prove it: he says.

⊙

One is zero and unity. All and everything. I learned this lesson in the woods, whilst listening too hard and asking too many questions.

Two is a perfect number. Mathematically speaking.

Three is a trinity manifested in a pyramide.

Four is a group that trains themselves in martial arts, as advertised.

Five refers to commercial success. Why?

Six makes me recall you, beast. And what it is to rotate this figure about the x-axis.

Seven reminds me of a trinity of 7’s, of Parzival.

Eight is hate not so far past.

Nine is three, six, and itself. This was the universe to Tesla.

And, ten? Ten is an order of magnitude. Ten makes sense for orientation.

Ten let’s me catch my breath: I concede to him.

I near the entrato the condo and a Vietnamese couple pulls aside me in their SUV.

How do we get to the coast?: the driver asks me through his cracked, automatic window.

Take a right at the stop sign, then, at the fountain on Main Street, take a right.

It is a roundabout.

Thank you. How lucky you are to live here: they say, after we struggle through language barriers and we repeat the same sentences between ourselves six times in total.

Yes, I am lucky to stay here: I reply.

I wave as they speed to the stop sign.

I told you that I needed to walk the block: I tell the No-One man.

He rolls his eyes.

A Watery Whale Wail

Have you ever stared, for a long time, at a large body of water?

More than an hour, or

until you can’t remember if the water is actually the sky and perhaps it is you that has been submerged in water the whole time?

Like maybe the horizon is a surfacing point where you and I breathe like whales?

Spouting our exhalations and thrilling the star ships above our surfaces.

It feels like when you sit in a room alone and repeat your own name aloud, for a minimum of three minutes.

Incepting yourself as you dialate time through your subjectI’ve experience.

Like purposefully esoteric, alternative spellings.

Dreamt of cold chilling

“I don’t get cold,” says the cool cat, “I just catch a chill.”

“Don’t steal my lines and then try to impress me with them,” I tease.

I point the left foot, of my crossed leg, from my seated position.

The bones structuring the top, flat part of my foot crackle themselves loose.

I make a strange, welp noise as I feel a tendon overstretch and then reassert itself back into place.

“You are so loud,” the cat moans, stepping over, circling and pawing my grounded, left foot. S/he finally lies down atop my foot.

A robust, white-tailed rabbit plods along in little plopping hops.

It has the legs of a frog.

The cat pounces at it. Claws pushing off me.

Sinking in. I do not yelp this time.

The rabbit reveals sparrow like wings and flies away.

A flying frog that mimics hares.

Reading my dreaming mind, the cat nods at me.

“This would make a a good illustrated children’s book.”

⊙

“Hey! Will you do that thing I like?” asks the cool cat.

I flip off the light switch and light a candle.

I make shadow puppets play and flit on the wall.

The cat tries to catch the intangible phantoms.

Slow Train (feat. Cate Le Bon) KEVIN MORBY

No rights: homage to a favorite in the house KC.

/I am barely on the ground/

/train/train/release the fire out of me/

/I don’t wanna burn/

/from the inside/

/n’ I dunno my name and I dunno my purpose/

/I just know my place on the slow train./

⊙

Slow train coming.

I’ll be ’round the bend, this backwoods gal, from Alabama.

Boy, without a doubt…

There’s a slow, slow train coming round the bend.

⊙

I nice dreamy song for those of you with a long weekend.

Or a burning heart.

I still remember

/Standin’ on the platform waiting for that train/

/Son, you are too late now/

/Train already came/

/waitin’ on a train that’s already come/

/come/

Hiss

The flicker of a whisper appears in my ears.

I hiss a response, in kind.

Sssssss.

Only one international phonetic alphabetic difference between:

Sssssss.

[and]

Zzzzzz.

In the English language.

Fricatives

voiced and voiceless.

Aspirated or otherwise.

⊙

My eyes narrow.

Simply evidence of closer observation and inspection,

no signal of disbelief.

Curiosity is the momentary suspension of belief.

Investigative.

Mettle of metal

being testing

in the seriousness of this series of silence.

Dream of rueing.

Your name is Ruin?: I ask.

No. RueAnne: she replies.

Why did you bring me back here?: I wonder.

I didn’t mean to: I hear her say.

She does not realize that she said this.

I nod anyway.

Certain geographies don’t agree with dream me.

This place rubs me wrong.

Edgy.

RueAnne is staring into nothing.

Her energy has been summoned.

She just lost herself again: I think.

A goat ambles by.