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Friday 26 July 2013

The Great Exchange


You are lost in a wood.
It is a real wood,
a wood you thought you knew --
that was until a moment back
when all the trees changed places
with their cousins from your dream.

Now here you are,
facing all the threats of dream
in vulnerable life.

You start to panic,
though in truth
not all the panic's yours.
Some comes from the wood.
There's panic in the leaves.
Which way will you go? they say.
Not this! Not that! Not there!
Not if you want to live!


There are whispers all around,
the snap of breaking twigs,
but you are frozen
in the moment of
The Great Exchange of Trees.

The trees are busy
(as they always are).
You are a paper cut-out
from another land.

The wind is slowly rising
and for sure will take you
to a place where what is real
is only dreamed about.

You see a thorn tree,
visualise yourself
impaled upon its horns.
You've seen the tree before.
It features in your dream.
There, the thorns are quite benign,
but here they drip with blood.
You wonder if it's yours.

A feather reassures.
The impaled one was a bird,
and you remember now
how in the dream the sky
was never crossed by birds.

Dream was a no-fly zone.
Birds need reality
the way reality needs birds.

You see a nest,
some fledgelings
and a kite.

The leaves are calmer now,
the birds are coming back.
The wood is less frenetic.

13 comments:

Carl said...

Nice sense of the way panic can drift over us and back out again.

Mary said...

A nest and some fledglings.....yes, good that the birds have returned, along with a calmness and hopefully hope.

Brian Miller said...

that was vivid and rather intense....esp at the thought of being impaled on the thorns...the feel of panic even in the trees as well...glad there is peace by the end...

Rachna Chhabria said...

I like the images the words have created.

Tabor said...

So frightening when stuff you thought you knew is all different and foreign.

Cait O'Connor said...

You are lost in a wood.
It is a real wood,
a wood you thought you knew --
that was until a moment back
when all the trees changed places
with their cousins from your dream.

You are a paper cut-out
from another land.

These lines spoke to me, the whole poem did actually. Loved it.

Tommaso Gervasutti said...

I was really taken by the whole vision, intensely vivid..with a feeling of the same intensity that the poem should continue!

The Weaver of Grass said...

I think this well describes the incongruity of a dream Dave.

ds said...

Yes, in dreams this happens. You describe the panic well, and the birds...I felt every line of this. Thank you.

Grace said...

You have a gift for story telling Dave ~ I enjoyed the imaginative leap of being lost in the woods ~

kaykuala said...

The panic in the trees can be frightening if not for the calming effects provided by the birds. Nicely Dave!

Hank

haricot said...

My feeling drift between dream and real world, panic and solace.

A Cuban In London said...

Just the other day I was reading about going into the woods at night. It's the most wonderful spectacle ever. I have done it with the Woodcraft a few times. I loved your poem. I really did. Many thanks.

Greetings from London.