Poem
Andrew Greig
THE BEST THING A DREAM
THE BEST THING A DREAM
THE BEST THING A DREAM
The best thing a dream can do for youis not prophecy nor
free entertainment from your inner lunatic,
not even the message
your mind is holed below the waterline
and will sink fast unless
you can find that length of rope
you somehow let slip overboard last year
(though it’s good to know the secret sharer of your life
remains on watch throughout the night,
a calm and I think magnificently bearded second-mate
— your first mate, beardless, sleeps beside you —
who will always truthfully report
the gravity of the buoyancy situation).
No, the best thing a dream
can do is remind you
it’s not true
and the distressed lady
carrying her mutilated liver in a handbag
will not die,
not because you’ve saved her or failed her
as you rummaged frantically through her entrails,
but because she does not exist.
It’s worth being reminded your mind
does this kind of thing most often
when you’re wide awake,
especially the distressed ladies,
and to truly wake up is to know the reason
you cannot grasp that rope underwater
is there is no rope, no water,
only grasping —
Oh to surface beside an entire lover
and feel your fingers slowly unhook
one by painful one!
© 2006, Andrew Greig
From: This Life, This Life
Publisher: Bloodaxe Books, Northumberland
From: This Life, This Life
Publisher: Bloodaxe Books, Northumberland
Andrew Greig
(United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 1951)
Andrew Greig was born in Bannockburn, Scotland, and grew up in Anstruther, Fife. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh and is a former Glasgow University Writing Fellow and Scottish Arts Council Scottish/Canadian Exchange Fellow. He won an Eric Gregory Award in 1972, and his first book of poetry, White Boats (with Catherine Lucy Czwerkawska), was published in 1973.
It was followed by Me...
It was followed by Me...
Poems
Poems of Andrew Greig
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THE BEST THING A DREAM
The best thing a dream can do for youis not prophecy nor
free entertainment from your inner lunatic,
not even the message
your mind is holed below the waterline
and will sink fast unless
you can find that length of rope
you somehow let slip overboard last year
(though it’s good to know the secret sharer of your life
remains on watch throughout the night,
a calm and I think magnificently bearded second-mate
— your first mate, beardless, sleeps beside you —
who will always truthfully report
the gravity of the buoyancy situation).
No, the best thing a dream
can do is remind you
it’s not true
and the distressed lady
carrying her mutilated liver in a handbag
will not die,
not because you’ve saved her or failed her
as you rummaged frantically through her entrails,
but because she does not exist.
It’s worth being reminded your mind
does this kind of thing most often
when you’re wide awake,
especially the distressed ladies,
and to truly wake up is to know the reason
you cannot grasp that rope underwater
is there is no rope, no water,
only grasping —
Oh to surface beside an entire lover
and feel your fingers slowly unhook
one by painful one!
From: This Life, This Life
THE BEST THING A DREAM
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