The Dreaming Place

A Thursday Poem

Hi friends,

It’s been a little while since I’ve shared a poem. This one came from a wide-awake dream. Life is so heavy, and life is so damn beautiful. Here’s to the alchemy of it all.

Kendall

Photo by Mike Labrum on Unsplash

The Dreaming Place

I dreamed of grief rushing out
of the open mouth of a feathered
warrior, reaching for the body
of his broken baby.

It flowed like an inky black river
from his lungs to the earth,
thicker than blood,
heavier than a bent over star.

His keening wail cut like water into rock,
shattering a path through granite walls,
the sound like fractured edges scraping
chalky scars in razor-sharp resistance.

The screaming river spilled right over
the edge of a cliff, and was caught
by a glowing, spherical nest— a mazelike
multi-chambered beehive, suspended.

As it descended from cell to cell, it was met
by a river of light, a honeyed escort—
a smooth, synchronous companion,
matching every writhing, twisting curve.

The inky waters rose like a great black lung,
heaving in swollen lament, and released
an unbearable sound. But the light, the light
did not flinch; it listened, rising to meet it,

absorbing every tortured note.
It thrummed like a guitar string,
matching its vibration, tenderly testing
the specific weight of the wound.

Do you know about resonance?
How, if you pluck a guitar’s A string
on one side of a room at exactly 110 hertz,
an A string on the other side of the space

will vibrate sympathetically,
at the exact same frequency?

So it was in the dreaming place,
where grief flowed beside light—
I saw the same phenomenon happen.
I listened as the scream reached the silent river,

and the sound was tenderly received
as an act of devotion. The waters locked eyes,
and a single strand of music sparked to life,
filling the chamber before slipping out,

right into the ear of the Listening Man,
whose eyes widened as he put his
fingers to the strings of his instrument,
and played a song so beautiful it broke my heart.

Perhaps, then, music is God’s way
of alchemizing grief. Perhaps every
luminous song that has ever made you cry,
began as a scream ripping into the earth.

Perhaps nothing is wasted,
if we sit with it long enough
to listen to the love that echoes
inside the lament.