Poetry, Dreams and Interpretation James Brandenburg
Mother Appears May 14, 2011 San Antonio, Texas
Dream: The first part of the dream takes place in Galveston, Indiana, where I lived as a child. We are in the living room in our old house; we lived in one of the three apartments. My mother was there. She was the age of her death, except her hair was pitch black, like it was when she was younger. There was a green figure 8 over the living room mantel, pressed against a dark background. I could not reach it. Mother had some sort of long tweezers and was able to retrieve it for me. She handed it to me, engaged with me, but seemed somewhat removed.
End of this part of the dream.
Comment: Personally, before I had this dream, there was much chaos in my life. I needed this dream, and the unconscious sent it to me. First of all, that my mother appears in this dream is profound. What a role model she was during my lifetime! Reserved, unassuming, positive, loving, caring, and giving, she embodied the essence of Christ. Her mind was clear until she died at the age of 89 from cancer. Yet she had always felt guilty for allowing me to live with my aunt and uncle in Kentucky during a particularly difficult point in her life (she suffered a nervous breakdown after my father abandoned us). However, I later lived with her and my sister for three years while I attended Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan. I was in contact with my mother until she died. She was a spiritual light and had the gift of a healer.
Psychologically, we can understand the eight as a symbol for the possibility or need for consciousness as a result of an inner development. The journey of the soul (seven steps) in the vessel of the psyche gives birth to the inner new light. My mother was the carrier of this new light in the dream. As completion of the seven steps, the eight is also connected to the realm beyond time and death, to the immortal soul and to eternity, a fact that we can see in the mathematical symbol for eternity—a horizontal 8. The message here is that there is supreme order and meaning in the soul, in spite of the chaos on the surface. Mother’s closeness to Christ is evident in this dream. Mother had the means (the tweezers) to retrieve this figure 8 for me (Theodor Abt, Introduction to Picture Interpretation, 148).
My Father: A Parting Memory James Brandenburg
My father played blocks with me winter’s fatigued breath falling on our cold floor and I felt all warm because my father played blocks with me the only toys I knew toys he gave me and I placed them one on top of another.
Meanwhile they came tumbling down blocks strewn like discarded fatalities all around and as I picked them up to place them he was gone.
Untitled, Ulrike Rowe
Komodo Marisol Macias
stealthy komodo king of lizards scale and muscle the locomotion of your legs so close to a slither
patient ever patient you become no threat an annoyance to an unsuspected leg
a slit from your teeth venom rot a lick of your tongue is enough
deadly lizard king komodo
the wait begins the heart bleeds dry and sick from a wound that cannot heal the bite of komodo
drained
the fever eats you the delirium begins komodo’s watchful eye
patient ever patient
strikes!
the kill your heart in his mouth
stealthy komodo lizard king
Comment: Often poems act like dreams, in that they come from the unconscious. “Komodo,” by Marisol Macías, is such a poem. Her poem was triggered by watching a documentary on the predatory behavior of the Komodo dragon, and, on reflection, she connected the behavior to herself as she would have been and a man with predatory behavior. She states that she wrote the poem as a person watching the scene unfold between prey and predator. Since she had been the object of prey in the past, she projected herself as watching what the outcome would have been if she were the prey. Her past Self would have been consumed by the small little nick that infected and consequently readied Komodo’s prey for a final fatal blow in which he could satisfy his own hunger. The present Self acknowledges the unconscious and is able to assess the progress that has been made towards a healthier attitude in relationships and now recognizes the signs to avoid future predators.
Komodo Dragon
A Dream within A Dream Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow— You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar Of a surf-tormented shore, And I hold within my hand Grains of the golden sand— How few! yet how they creep Through my fingers to the deep, While I weep—while I weep! O God! can I not grasp Them with a tighter clasp? O God! can I not save One from the pitiless wave? Is all that we see or seem But a dream within a dream?
Healing through Art and Poetry
Mothers Gidge Trott
There are a variety of Mothers. Some are fun - but there are others - Some who hold the reins too tight, Some who make a dull day bright. The one who sits up waiting - late into the night, Then slips into bed and is “fast asleep” When you turn out your light. The dream some Mothers have, that makes them feel secure, That you will meet that perfect “someone,” Good looking, rich, mature. The one at the wedding who will shed a happy tear, then close the door, kick off her shoes, and change to more comfortable gear. There are some who find it hard to loosen the apron strings. Yet others would gladly cut them off to do more exciting things. But Mothers the world over are really a lot the same. They all have the cleverest, brightest, most beautiful babies in every form and name. It’s love that motivates them all, to let you know what’s good in life With everything to gain. So let’s be gentle to our Mothers On this coming Mother’s Day. Send them a card or give them a gift. Just spoil them generally. It’s a special time when you can show That you treasure the love she gives. So—no excuses, if it’s only a call!— no matter where she lives.
Sol Macias, The Thought Process
Potential William Z. Saunders
I have been on one heckuva hiatus from doing any real writing for some stretch of time. Call it a season. I got behind and quit growing again. It happens. Like I imagine heavyweight boxers get fat after a big fight, my output tends to dwindle after a deadline, or when I finish a semester of school. I like to prove my procrastination in terms of not writing/reading and resting, instead of maintaining and training during the off-season. I take my eyes off the prize and instead stand still beside the kill like a cat would drag a corpse to the doorstep, so that you’ll see what I’ve done. I like attention, and praise, but it cuts both ways, because I forget to jam the juice to utilize the flow and you know….what it brings.
I get behind everything, but the big one that blocks me up is a mess, my mess. I let clutter pile up, and dust, and dishes. And I push it aside, and allow more of a mess to amass, until I have a mountain of crud between me and the world. It’s always there, but I am a great pretender. The mind moves it out-of-the-way, but it stays there stuck in the valve conductor of heart/mind/god/machine/creator/reality. And, it takes a motivator to move her toward either the uplift or the downfall. See for me, I have found, that in inspiration there ain’t no middle ground.
Jennifer Schooley, Greenback Valentine
Every Day Earl Salazar
Every Day with every step forward I get pushed back. Every Day I stumble through life in the dark. Every Day I fall a little farther from Grace. Every Day I fall or am pushed down again and again and Every Day I get pushed back I step forward again. Every Day I stumble in the dark I keep walking. Every Day I fall from Grace I keep looking for the light. Every Day I fall I get back up, Slower but I get back up.
Seeking a Name Lianne Mercer
the animal cries at dawn moan without melody hum of night abandoning its familiar long blowing of nose trumpet keening across fields and failings of light scritch of fingernails on glass arthritic clock hands syncopating time hoarse teakettle whinnying on stove rusty saw seizing wood now ashes sadness slithering down bark final hurrah hurtling into silence
Purple Sharon Luna
Protected by the strands of gold. Purple in the driven snow. Keeping warmth in troubled times. Finding peace they left behind.
Oh soul of mine, you’ve seen with time the riddles taught beyond the lines of what we think and what we speak. In joys and tears is where we meet.
So take me now away from here. Only there we disappear. Protected by the strands of gold. Purple in the driven snow.
Boulevard of Broken Dreams Sophia E. DiGonis
It’s the street where all hopes and dreams are made, Recycled and reinvented—it’s all Hollywood. Everyone here has the same goal, but on a different path, A different road and quite possibly, a different purpose.
The same people, the same kind of people That discover the “next big thing” and it feels like The same act makes it every ten years…
The same struggles, the same suffering, Only to continue to work on the same boulevard, The same road only to be discovered by the same people.
For as far as I know, the same people who hire for projects In music and films have seen Clark Gable and Mae West Perform in their prime!
Hollywood—it’s all Hollywood. The same formula was used then, as it is now.
The picture, the painting of Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Humphrey Bogart And Dean Martin as the bar tender—this picture says a lot— Such a mesmerizing picture of these iconic figures that Hollywood has set Standards for us all—
I can relate to this picture, and possibly Those observing this picture would want to be At least one of these figures for just a moment in their lives to escape their own problems.
But if you look at these figures’ lives, of the drinking, other addictions And the pressures to be who they really are— Is that desired? Do we really want that? That is the question.
How can you take it? How can you handle it? Do you really want that kind of pressure?
Some of us have dealt with that kind of pressure all our lives. As I look at the bar of these figures of Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Humphrey Bogart, and Dean Martin— In that moment, I understand their pressures from the rest of the world because I feel that same way. However, I realize in the long run, it is nothing...
In the world of Hollywood, there could one day be another me! Tomorrow, in ten minutes, or ten years!
Because the stars of tomorrow emulate the stars of yesterday!
I am correct in calling it the Boulevard of Broken Dreams— Because the moment, another you, or another me is made Means that the dream is over…
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