Today I share an old poem. I came upon it in a drawer yesterday, and remembered that there were many times when I pulled it out and tried to find a way to share it.
It is a source of deep joy and gratitude to me to have found my sense of I Am. I am a poet. There were signs of this all my life, but I didn’t recognize them because I had the false belief that my I Am had to be something acceptable, as in, providing a lucrative career, or at least a living. I’ve found that it’s something else — it’s the understanding of who I am that I really belong to, belong in. The center of my worth. The thing I don’t have to prove to anybody. I have found that I Am for myself as a poet.
Even before I knew that, poems marked important realizations in my life. The one I’m sharing today was the one where I realized that I didn’t need, anymore or ever, to be afraid that I would never find love. The realization came to me in a dream and in reflecting on it in the morning. The poem solidified it in my thought. This happened in the gap year I took between my sophomore and junior years of college, and I started experiencing the truth of it the next year.
The poem is long, as it points out in its beginning. It came to me all in a rush the morning after the dream, which occurred while I was visiting my uncle and aunt in Vermont. I altered it a little some years later.
Dream Song
Something caught my eye
and caught my mind with equal fury —
Though my senses, numbed and startled,
caught its image, it was blurry
Let my heart help me remember,
let my craft help make it strong
that the people all may hear it
in the rhythm of my song
I said, Child, don’t write an epic
for it never will be read
and songs that no one sings
will still keep pacing through your head
Yet I couldn’t write for buyers
and I couldn’t write for cheers
and I couldn’t write for angels
till I’d exorcised their fears,
for even gilded ceilings tumble, shambled, in defeat,
and then will come the victory of the grass beneath the street
If no one hears my story, it still will mean something,
The golden empress trumpets dawn
and so I sing:
The day has risen on my dream
which, though it’s faded, leaves a gleam
that tints the corners of my sight
with color, and with swift delight
In content and in skilled design
no dream I’ve had has been so fine —
When I awoke I surely knew
it was so good, it must come true.
From my dark and timid places
where my tender hopes crouched still,
I’ve beheld the flowing graces
of the dancers in their skill —
It looked so easy, yet my limbs,
young and untried,
had no chance
nor impulse to arise and join the dance
So I could never say I’m graceful
or know if my nimble feet
would move surely with the rhythm
or sadly off the beat
I’ve had friends who have had lovers
and their glances were secure,
and I tried to learn their secret —
how their love could be so sure,
because my love has been so doubt-filled,
or I’m sure, but then I’m wrong
and I find myself most lonely
when trying to belong,
and though I was strong and cheerful,
others had their dreams fulfilled,
and I, at times, grew fearful
that my urge to love be chilled
And yet, with clearer eyes, I saw the pain
of ties ill-bound —
how certain hell took reign
as hope unwound,
and how loveless demands
could prey upon their peace
and wound the struggling hands
that sought release
Across this troubled thought moved my dream
with warming peace of sun’s midmorning beam:
In dappled shade, we sat and talked,
my friend and I, upon a rock
where forest stretched below and cliffs above,
in summer’s golden light, we talked of love.
To know so clearly how we felt and where we stood,
how we both loved each other, and that it was good
resolved my turbid doubts about my days
and made my greatest triumph be their praise
When I awoke and knew that this was mine
I saw I needn’t wait for some great love to come
to shine:
The gift of love awaits
in each day as in each dream —
There is no need to stalk or scheme.
Arise, arise, behold the eyes
of she that cries “awaken, skies!”
The golden empress trumpets dawn
and says to dark “be gone, be gone.”
And so, my song is written
and I’m glad I chose to speak
and it gives me joy and courage
to be finding what I seek,
And when the evening deepens,
as the shadows fall in place,
I will set a watch upon the night
to hold my thought in grace:
The umber empress of the fire
guards amber warmth and purple spire,
as embers glimmer, ashes heap,
now lights arise in dream-blessed sleep.
©Wendy Mulhern
