in a dream of white lead
I heard the word
"Mayakovsky"!
you said that dream
should come to you, not me,
but can dreams be chosen?
later I dreamed that Joseph Brodsky
returned to his first
New York apartment
one week after his death,
stunned by the vacancy.
and in next year's ochre-lighted dream,
to a furnished one, complete
with friends and reviewers:
smiling, in a light apart
at their consternation,
serene
as once he stood before
Soviet tribunals so
clearly, tenderly, ironically
"decided by God"
mary angela douglas 30 september 2000/31 may 2005
copyright 2006
