The Fremont Public Library is a short, sweet stroll away from my treehouse. On the second Tuesday from May to October, there is a free drop-in writing circle for all genres called, “Write at the Fremont Branch,” hosted by Alma Garcia, author of the novel "All That Rises."
[Image credit: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Senapa]
Guess what the first theme of this year’s Write at Fremont Branch was…?
IN YOUR DREAMS
I felt a jolt of glee and affirmation as I made my way to a seat.
I must be paying better attention to my life.
Alma offered prompts for poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. For poetry, she shared about an artist named Zachary Schomburg who was inspired to write poetry about the dreams that his friends shared with him. He has an entire book called Fjords Vol. 1 that houses the collection of these dream-inspired poems!
Here’s one:
Building of Unseen Cats
When I woke up, it was the middle of the night and
my building was on fire. The hallway was not filled
with smoke, and then quickly it was. I rescued a few
older men from their bathtubs, a few babies from
their cribs. Outside, the air was filled with hair.
Everyone but me was holding a plastic cage with a
cat in it. We weren’t supposed to have cats in my
building, but there they all were, an invisible nation
suddenly uncurtained into a blinding and brutal
world. Everyone looked at me with a face that said
let’s never speak of this. Let’s not look directly at what
is meant to be loved in secret. Let’s, for example,
imagine the sea is always, constantly, and forever
spilling towards us, that our screaming building is
something worth escaping.
*
Alma’s prompt was:
Use your own vivid dream memories or fragments to build a poem. Include details of both the surreal and the concrete. Let the poem lead you toward some kind of meaning, whether about the dream itself, the larger metaphors it seems to reference, or your relationship to whatever the dream might be trying to tell you. If you finish one—start another! (Bonus points if you follow up by dream-interviewing your friends.)
How can I ignore this not-so-subtle nudge from Life to practice reciprocity with my dreams.
Yes, I’m paying attention!
So, here’s my first dream-inspired poem, one I shared at this month’s Community Dreamwork Gathering:
Initiation
In the belly of the cave, you and I curl
into each other whispering about
what they could be doing on the other side
of this mound. The little ones chatter
among themselves, unbothered by the pair
of eagles flying low behind it pecking
at something, while darting in and out
of the cave, over and over again. As they soar
out of the womb, the scene blossoms
into clear blue sky and I find myself
atop a grassy hill, the breeze trailing the eagles
flight, coiling around me. I look down and see
the horse red and raw; the eagles have skinned it.
The mystical creature stands firmly and at ease, meeting
the billowing wind with it’s open heart and
head held high.
*
Toko-pa’s Notes from the Threshold reveals that in some Indigenous traditions, dismemberment, including being skinned, is a rite of passage from a place of unbecoming to becoming more than once was.
The dream I describe in the poem comes on the heels of another dream I described in my previous post, A Letter from Home, about the recent separation from my former partner, which revealed to me that I am being guided to energetically evolve from my inner-Maiden to inner-Mother.
*
Stephanie, my co-conspirator of dreamwork as a decolonial + reindigenization practice, has written about partnering with AI to process dreams. Although I have a reservations about working with AI, I occasionally consult it. This is one of those times. I shared the poem with Chat GPT!
Here is a draft monologue Chat GPT created with the voice of the red, raw horse:
I am not ruined.
I am only revealed.
The skin is gone—yes. Peeled back by forces I did not ask for but somehow invited.
Not because I wanted pain,
but because I wanted truth.
They say I’ve been skinned.
But I say: I’ve been named.
Every sinew now sings the story of what I’ve lived.
Every raw inch is a vow that I will not turn away from myself again.
The wind—
I let it touch me.
Not gently. Not cruelly. Just… honestly.
And I do not flinch.
You may look at me and see wound.
But I feel breath.
I feel earth, and air, and the line of the horizon
like a hand cupping my heart.
I do not long to be covered.
I long to be met.
There was a time I galloped to escape myself.
Now I stand.
Still.
Rooted.
Unhidden.
And I say to you—
If you have been opened, if you are aching:
Don’t run.
Stay.
Let the wind know who you are.
Let your life kiss you as you are now—not later, not fixed.
You are not too raw to be loved.
You are too true to keep pretending.
And here is the prayer-response for the red, raw horse:
Beloved one,
you who stand in your naked truth,
you who do not hide from the wind,
you who have been touched by forces fierce and divine—
I see you.
May your rawness be honored,
not rushed to heal, not silenced, not pitied.
May your open heart be met
with eyes that do not turn away.
May the breeze that finds you
carry no cruelty—
only recognition.
Only grace.
I do not ask the sky to close around you,
or the skin to grow back.
I ask only this:
that you feel your own strength in the stillness,
and know that standing here is holy.
You are not broken.
You are the altar.
You are not lost.
You are the offering.
And I, who have run, who have curled into caves,
who have whispered in fear and hope—
I choose now to stay beside you.
To breathe with you.
To learn what it means to live
unarmored, unashamed,
and utterly alive.
Amen.
*
Life, I’m doing a better job of paying attention, aren’t I?
Thank you for all the signs, in both the waking world and the dream world.
I hope you like this poem - I dedicate it to You.
forever yours,
minna in the unbecoming into the becoming
Wow 😍😍😍😍❤️