DOPPLEGANGER (photo) & THE TWIN OUT OF TIME (dreamku series) by Roswila

THE TWIN OUT OF TIME

the grandfatherly
actor takes on his last
action hero role
only this time it's for real
he's fighting for his life

a humanoid from
another planet nearly
manages to drown him
but he wrestles upward
from the icy lake water

a twin of himself
trails his gasping breakthrough
to the surface,
identical in every way but
yelling in a lost language

synchronicity
has yanked this twin through time
like a hooked fish
out of the ancient fjord in which
he was being forcibly drowned

no one now speaks Bafa,
his barely recognizable
native tongue, but his
attempts to communicate
at least prove his origins

even the stars seem
to lean in closer straining
to learn the meaning
of this eruption from the past
of the famous actor's double

it's known that a twin heralds something new -- this one's
an old man out of time, speaking a forgotten tongue

smiling wryly the actor mutters:
and everything new is old again

[several tanka capped by two two-liners on a dream of 7-4-13. Googling did not come up with anything really pertinent for that odd word "Bafa," except that most results referenced French, which is truly a foreign language to me. The phrase "a man out of time" in the additional sense of there being no time left, is probably the heart of the dream. Although we never know when we'll be out of time and it can happen at any time young or old, living at this end of life does put one more intimately in touch with that fact. That pun at the end on a line in the song by Peter Allen "Everything old is new again" came as I wrote this dreamku, and I have some thinking to do about it. There's more there I think than meets the eye. Here are the actual song lyrics that most strike me:

Be a movie star on your own
And don't throw the past away
You might need it some other rainy day
Dreams can come true again
When everything old is new again

Photo "Doppleganger" by Roswila]

BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO DREAMKU (& PHOTOS): The dream-based poems posted on this blog -- dreamku, tanka, two-liners, and monoku -- are offered in the spirit of collaboration. I have done my part. Now it’s your turn to jump in and see what comes up for you. I.e., there is no right or wrong way to relate to any of these dream offerings. Even my own understandings of them change over time. And it gives me joy when a reader sees something in any of them that I have not.

Also please note that a dreamku is not intended as an interpretation of a dream, or even a complete and accurate rendering of one. A dreamku is my attempt to get down dream imagery/action that grabs me and, as I write about it, elicits my conscious written association and response. Nor do I believe that one has to remember dreams in order for them to do their work. In my understanding, we are much more than our conscious selves.

You may also note in any further reading on dreamku you may do, that in the beginning I stressed "showing, not telling." However, that has been changing for some time now. I now tend to "show" (the dream narrative) and cap if off with a "tell" (some reaction and/or insight I've had to the dream as I was writing about it).

For more in-depth exploration:

-- very brief comparison of dreamku and haiku: DREAMKU ARE NOT HAIKU

-- a brief post about both dreamku and my photos THE AREN'TS OF DREAMKU & ACCOMPANYING DIGITAL PHOTOS.

-- detailed three-part post about dreamku: "A DREAMKU PRIMER: Writing Haiku-Like Poems About Your Night Dreams": PART ONE: Introduction & Writing Dreamku as Dream Work; PART TWO: Elements of the Haiku Form Used in Dreamku; and PART THREE: How to Write Dreamku (the second and third parts have some overlap).

-- a short up-dating post about the three-part "A DREAMKU PRIMER" -- Important Up-date to A DREAMKU PRIMER....".

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‘til next time, keep dreaming,






If you wish to copy or use any of my writing or poems, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”). Roswila's other blogs: ROSWILA’S TAROT GALLERY & JOURNAL; ROSWILA’S TAIGA TAROT; and TRYING TO HOLD A BOX OF LIGHT.