I had a rough night last night, did not get much sleep, and so I ended up napping about 4 o’clock. My last dream of the nap was vivid. It was nighttime and a woman (my mother I think) had thrown a baby into the lake. A friend and I stood there on the dock in shock. Then we realized that he would go find assistance and I would go into the dark water.

First, we stood and looked for the rings left from the baby’s plunge into the water, and I aimed in that direction. I opened my eyes underwater, but of course there was nothing to be seen in the dark. I still, however, immediately found the baby, sort of floating near the surface.

And then I began rescue. I pounded heartily on the baby’s back to cause vomiting of lake waters (all over me). And then some mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Cold baby.

And then I woke.

Looking back of course my first-aid technique was all wrong (I may have sensed that even in my sleep), but what a marvel that I had plunged right in the cold, dark waters, and then actually found the infant and started revival efforts.

Weird, and interesting.

∞ ∞ ∞

On another note entirely, a little bit ago a friend sent me a link to a poem. It is pretty heavy, but some messages are.

The Dream

I dreamed that you had ceased to love me—
not that you had come from other beds
back to mine, or gone from mine to others,
just that something in your heart had stopped.

I willed myself awake to find you still
beside me. It was just a dream, I thought,
yet when I turned to kiss you, in your eyes
I saw that you had ceased to love me.

I willed myself awake a second time
to find myself alone, as I have been
these many months, but did not know if it
was terror or relief I felt, and whether

dreams unfold the past or make the future
plain. I dreamed that you had ceased to love me,
and know when I see nothing in your eyes
I can’t dream myself awake a third time.

—David Solway