written By
It’s hard to be a city at night, sleeping along this big river. So much wakes you
from slumber—mill whistles, sirens, dogs barking, people falling up and
down stairs, babies crying to be fed or changed, couples in bedrooms or cars
making loud love. When it comes down to it, I wake even when doors slam
and when people shout too loud and long.
Oh, I still watch over you—mother and father to a tribe awake or asleep. And
yes, I worry about floods and fires, heart attacks, and car accidents. I’m also
there for all births and deaths. I count you all as precious, though I do accept
nature’s course—Flow like a river, open like a sky./ Feed the heart, yet bow
the head.
Sometimes in night’s quiet middle, I dream of fish flying about the room,
trains climbing up my back and arms, skirts twirling, golden hair falling over
milky breasts—Yes, I’m alive! And sometimes nightmare phantoms swirl in
mill light, then creep along streets to peep into windows, carrying guns and
knives.
In one dream, our mill rolls up like a newspaper then drifts away downriver.
We all stand mute like at the end of a long movie. As it fades to darkness, I
jerk myself awake, then lie there ‘till breathing softens and I reach over again
to turn on the lights.
I rise to the rich smell of coffee being brewed in houses, the sounds of people
showering, dressing for work, getting kids off to schools, maybe saying a few
silent prayers for self and others. All of us meeting the day, all of us working
through our dreams.
