The Dream

6 the minnesota review Fred Pfeil The Dream (for Tony turning 50; and in memory of Michael, Lynn, and Anne) In the dream I shared with you back then, Tony, we moved through rambling ruins, a rotten estate. We were not alone; our hands joined us to others. Those nearest ones we knew best and loved most: Lynn and Stan, Anne and Michael, Rich, Thérèse. Whose hands exactly, though, held ours I couldn't tell you then or now, as we led and were led through shrieking rooms, weeping doors, chambers only winter light reached: rooms with viscera for walls, scars for carpets— rooms torturers lit up as propagandists brewed tea—some, surprisingly, so richly furnished, warm and bright, we longed to but could not stop; our hands drew us on, visible and out of sight, same as those we hauled behind, Pfeil our coffle's weariness made dance only via the conviction that up ahead some must've reached outside by now, even now while we still moved kept on moving room to room ...