Dreaming isn’t thinking,
That hypnogogic sinking
Into the unblind unblinking.
Its images are un-clocked
Memories, mostly mocked
Distortions of what we are now,
Hurt children crying “Ow!”
We meet there the half known,
Not projected but shown
Us for no intelligible reason,
A fifth, black and white, season,
If wish fulfillment, unfilled,
Or a silent movie unbilled.
Though occasional nightmares
Will scare us with dead stares,
Only awake will we, screaming,
Take for real the seeming,
Mistake the dream for meaning.