long waves pull us across

Another dream of water rising last night, interrupted by waking. Whenever I have one of these dreams in which water rises out of the earth, and moves with a life of its own, usually it means that soon a creative surge will wash over me. They are waters of the spirit, rising from that black underground river that is the source of and power behind everything that I do. This wave rising last night felt like the end of a period of dry tribulation, a closure on the aches of recent days. I wake to wind and cool skies, the flowers in the garden shockingly bright in the morning sun.

•

water clear transparent foamless
only a little floatsam in its crystal polygons
surges up in tall waves that we ride
across the concrete dock

we came here on a mission
urgent laconic well-informed
gathered in this concrete shelter
as storm floods rose high outside

now waves rise and pull us smooth
across the long floor's scatter of tools
I receive a call from the home office
I am summoned there directly

to solve some unnamed problem
so our group splits up for now
waves of water rising clear not cold
carry me past docks to open sky land

•

In recent days I find myself wanting to record significant dreams, when there are any, in the form of poems. Poems, rather than prose, because I can use in a poem dream-logic language, compressed and telegraphic, full of archetypal images that you can just present without feeling like you need to explain them. Poems are closer to dream-language anyway. Much closer than most prose, except of course prose-poems. There is a tradition of dream-poems, of course, from ancient times to modern. Maybe I'll end up with a set of dream-poems, a small body of work, before I move on to the next thing. I don't plan poems ahead like that, though. I just wait to see what happens.

That source of creative power, that underground river, when it surges, you do best to ride on its waves in the middle of the current. You cannot force something so much greater than yourself into a narrow channel of your own ambitions; it will explode outwards and break through the banks. Don't try to get too close to shore, just stay on your raft. The surge will eventually level out, although it's likely to return again later on, and meanwhile the water level is higher than before. A bard surfs these waves rather than being so unwise as to try to paddle against them. Going with the flow, indeed.