Have you ever seen yourself in a dream?
I have. Long ago.
I remembered it last Saturday during Ethical ELA’s Open Write when the host, James Coats, invited participants to write a poem that’s “ultimately a reflective piece – a moment to examine who we were, who we are, and who we might want to be.” He called this “Looking Back to Look Forward.”
Something in this language sparked the memory…as vivid as if it happened yesterday…
Me Seeing Me in a Dream
When I was nine
I dreamed
that I was watching myself
sitting at a desk
in the classroom
I could see myself
so clearly
writing something
on paper
then looking up
in contemplation
I knew there was some
urgent message
I needed to tell myself
but I couldn’t get
my attention
I couldn’t get me
to look my way
The me in my dream
sat completely unaware
that I stood before me,
invisible,
unable to break through
some forbidding
force field
I stood before me
as if I were
my own ghost
Five decades later
I remember this dream
and the despair
of being unable to
communicate with me
and I wonder:
What could that message
of such urgency even be
from child-me
to child-me?
Other than
dear me
pay attention
please save yourself
so much trouble
in life
keep learning
keep dreaming
keep writing
these will
navigate you through
all the unseen things
ahead
including
you.
“Reflection“. toddwendy .CC BY 2.0.
*******
Composed for Day 23 of the Slice of Life Story Challenge with Two Writing Teachers
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This slice works so well as a poem! Your word choice and line breaks set the tone and pace and the readers is intrigued to discover more about this dream. I especially like the interpretation of the dream – such great advice!
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Thank you so much, Sally – the dream is vivid in my memory for the frustration of not being able to communicate with my other self. I am glad to have captured it, at last, while I do remember it! I tried for the poem to unfold in the way the dream did.
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Fran, I was touched by this poem the first time I read it and again this morning. You truly have a gift of taking thoughts and reflections and making sense of things in a way that applies to life – like Samuel and Noah and other Biblical icons who listened – or didn’t, like Jonah. And you give yourself the good advice. We remembered our dreams this morning – my husband’s was a dogfight with a dog of his he’d never seen and another dog like it, and mine was discovering fleas on an infant and trying to pick them off. I want the sweet dreams – – when the malfunctioning sound machine lets us sleep. Perfect words in your poem for keeping on learning, dreaming, and writing.
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Thank you for these deep reflections, Kim – that dream stays clear in my memory for the angst of my not being able to communicate with my other separate self. Those dream images of yours and your husband’s are so intriguing! Don’t we all wish for the sweet dreams, the ones so wonderful that we don’t want them to leave us, or that we wish we could get back into again. Drat that malfunctioning sound machine-!
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Wow, Fran. Talk about reflection, literally and figuratively. This message in a bottle in the form of a dream is so meta. Sometimes we find what we need in our dreams. For me I am finding connections in every slice I have read today. Your age nine dream links with my nines post and the fact I woke up from multiple unsettling dreams last night. But reading your slice, these words comfort-
”keep learning
keep dreaming
keep writing
these will
navigate you through
all the unseen things
ahead”
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I am amazed at how the same pieces of ideas fall upon so many of us at the same time…these meaningful connections…the nines, the dreams. So fascinating! I am glad those lines comfort. In my dream the other projected me was writing – and the dreaming me so urgently wanted to break through. I think I wanted to protect me 🙂
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Oh Yes, Fran – ”Keep learning, keep dreaming, keep writing.” It was written in the stars that you would be a teacher and a writer and a hundred other wonderful things to the people you love and who love you!
I have a recurring dream. I see myself as a young adult around 20, and I’m walking down a series of roads. I come to a house that I lived in as a child. It is empty, now but I look through all the rooms searching for something. When I’m just about to find it, I wake up. I’ve had that dream for many years, though I haven’t had it lately. I wonder what treasure I’m looking for.
I know we are writing sisters now because I wrote a poem called “The Gift” many years ago with the lines:
“But just keep writing because it’s part of me,
Like breathing in air and exhaling,
Because it keeps me alive,
Because it connects me to the world…”
Fran, I am so glad I am connected to your world! Thank you for all your lovely writings and reflections!
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Joanne, I used to have recurring dreams about impossibly high and twisted bridges I had to cross…I don’t dream those any more, either. Your dream is really compelling. I can’t help wondering what childhood object/memory/person/desire the young you is searching for. We surely are writing sisters – how wonderful! – our worlds being so connected that we probably share the same room! Thank you for this gift your words and heart.
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I never remember dreams for more than seconds after I wake, so I marvel you can remember yours from decades ago. I love the way you have used the dream to speak to yourself now and remind yourself of what is just as important now as then, to keep learning, dreaming and writing.
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I’ve had a few dreams that were so vivid and impactful that I remember them over the years. Some good, some not. In recent years I srtrted a dream journal to capture and remember some of the more interesting images – for most do dissolve quickly.
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This poem feels like a lesson in creating a specific mood.
I did have a recurring nightmare where I saw myself, many selves. Nothing especially horrific occured. I just told myself “No,” but I always woke up terrified.
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Many selves-! I suspect I’d wake with a sense of terror, too, or at least great unsettledness. So fascinating, dreams.
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This poem kept me wondering the whole way through – the spacing, the pacing of ideas, and the “formidable force” as a barrier to communication with oneself feels like your younger self had insight into what can and often does happen as we age – we lose the connection to our own voice. This narrative poem has man potential themes and it’s beautiful, Fran.
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I so appreciate your thoughts about the poem, Melanie, and I agree – there could be many themes.
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I tried to remember if I have ever seen myself in a dream…and to be honest, I’m not sure, so this phenomenon in today’s post intrigues me! I could sense your frustration clearly, though maybe, as you end up resolving, the action of writing was the intended message–to keep on engaging with putting pen to paper. Which you do with grace and skill!
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I recall being shocked at seeing myself sitting at the desk so vividly, then surprised that it was a one-way sighting, with the other me unaware. I so wanted to break through to myself…a lot of metaphor for a dreaming nine-year-old! Thank you for those lovely words, Chris.
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What an amazing dream – and such a gift to remember it. I love the dreamy quality of this writing about the dream.
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Thank you! I so appreciate your thoughts 🙂
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Fran, such a rich reflection on trying to communicate with the you in the dream. I so love the universal advice you took from it: keep dreaming, learning, and writing.
“these will
navigate you through
all the unseen things
ahead
including
you.”
Yes, sometimes we need to be navigated through ourselves too. Beautiful insights!
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Thank you for every takeaway and gracious thought you share here, Denise. I would have some rough years ahead, but neither the dreaming me or the other me who sat so unaware could know. Yet I think the dreaming me felt protective. The real me would not always be so…but… writing, learning, and dreaming really would get me through.
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Isn’t it interesting that we can remember some of our dreams all these years later? I have a few I can remember from childhood too. I like how you reflected on what it could mean in this poem.
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It was such a vivid dream, Jennifer – I am glad to have written about it, finally.
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