DREAM CHARTS
As I read through Donna Henes’ book Dressing Our Wounds in Warm Clothes, her dream charts inspired me. She wove these writings throughout her documentary. Each hold significance. I thought I would give it a try. I used to have a very active dream life but needed to squelch it because of night terrors. I now have more trouble remembering them after I wake up. Sometimes it’s a narrative, sometimes there’s an entire symphony (not based on any I know). If I woke up with a song playing in my head I would hum it and hum it until I could jot down notation. I have since lost those random pieces of paper and honestly, they probably would make little sense to me now. Similarly, I decided to jot down anything I could remember, flashes of color, movement, people. Odd reconstructions, really, but some connected. Fledglings is one of those pieces relating in my mind to infant mortality, like young beautiful chicks just starting to show their color, their potential, bought at a store by God and taken to His mansion in glory. Parents uncertain of what had just transpired. It’s how I feel in a way, but my subconscious interpreted it in vision and sound as a unique metaphor.
Charting my dreams has been challenging and frustrating. A few nuggets come once a week or every other week, but sometimes the dreams slip through. For instance this morning I awoke from a dream I had just flipped a page and read a four line poem. Beautiful, I thought. I wonder who wrote it. No one yet… I realized this and knew I needed to wake up and write it, but when I woke up I could only scribble the last few words and I am unsure if it was accurate “turning to sob and couples ache.” My process merging in mind. Narrative Poetry and Dream Charting becoming one. It was an interesting and exciting discovery. Now if only I could record my dreams…
While I am unsure of how these writings will manifest in a final form, I am enjoying this process of working with some raw material. Finding new ways to explore and express my identity and experience before and after my son.
