Sleeping in Chinese Boxes

This is a poem that tells in a few lines an experience that is told in more detail in my book Patchwork Faces of the Moon. The image above is one of the few paintings that I have done; it was destroyed in a fire when my cabin in Bastrop County burned down in 2001. This painting and poem can also be found on my website "Through My Window," although the poem here has been revised. I will get around to changing it on that site eventually.


Sleeping in Chinese Boxes

Darkness covers my eyes
A soft quilt covers my thighs
Sleep uncovers lucid dreams
Where nothing is quite what it seems

A kiss turns into a shout
The sound I feel sharp as pain
Moods alter ... Colors washout
Things change faces ... I can't explain

A place I know ... but not true
Somewhere I've been ... somehow new
I shrink, fly, sink, and then grow
In and out of the rabbit hole

I wake in a foggy maze
Tell my dream while still dreaming
Many times I wake up ... dazed ...
Explain this Chinese boxes theme

Growing longer each time told
New verse added to the old
I rant like a lunatic
About dream-ripples concentric

I lose solid thought and freak
Falling through scene after scene
Lost in the mirrors of sleep
My life chases shadows of dream

-VCW

My Art For IASD 2008

I had a nice time visiting the International Association of the Study of Dreams in their cyber conference which ended the 5th of October. There was wonderful art and lots of great workshops and informative papers and lively conversation on the threads. I entered five pieces of art, each with a dream verse-- dreamku or series. I decided that I should display a couple of them here since they all have to do with dreaming and may subsequently be included in Patchwork Faces of the Moon or one of the sequels that I plan.

Piercing Eyes

Piercing Eyes is a good example of how creating art can help you focus on your dreamwork. After I started manipulating photos of myself in Photoshop's Image/Adjust/Curves ... It didn't look much like me anymore. I thought ... I know that face though ... it looks Native American ... I have seen it in my dreams. It is the face of a man, and in my dreams he is dressed rather like anyone might be, so I don't know exactly how I know that he is American Indian. He does seem to be wearing long hair in a pony tail. He is never a main player in my dreams, but a reoccurring extra ... so to speak. I started remembering him only after I saw his face in my art. Then I recalled him lingering around in the peripheral of my dreamscape. I hardy ever notice him in my dreams ... but remember him on awakening. I think he is a good guy. Maybe an ancestor trying to get my attention and guide me. He does look a little like me ... in a strange-colored dream-altered kind of way.

piercing eyes
quiet mixed blood holds
proud Cherokee traits

I should mention that I am part Cherokee, albeit only about an eighth.

Tree Watcher

Tree Watcher is a reflection of many dreams I experience where everything seems more real than reality. Things are clearer, poignant, alive -- rather like Alice in Wonderland meets Bilbo Baggins.

The message is a Dreamku series. Dreamku is a form of verse akin to Haiku. Most rules apply, but being dream-based verse, these phrases try to capture a moment in a dream. As a series, the verse may encapsulate several moments, but each separate three-line stanza should stand on it’s on. Many of you will remember Patricia Kelly from her workshop last year. I have worked with her all year by email and in her Yahoo group, Dreamjin, learning the art of Dreamku. It is an excellent tool for dream exploration an often cuts to the core of the dream when you are searching for that perfect word.

past and future
beneath your sentinel gaze
collisions abound

like heat waves
our lives mere shimmers
ancient eyes blink

human echoes trace
heat rising fast to heaven
you frozen between

Check out my VCW Original Art Message Cards at YouPublish.com

Dreamku Haiga - Ink Blots #4

This is the last 'Ink Blots' image variation that will be put up. If you are so inclined, please comment on which one you like the best. Remember ... I am working on enlarging the text size of the Dreamku in #1 and #2. My friend Patricia Kelly mentioned that the word 'beyond' kept replacing the word 'behind' as she read the dreamku. After rolling it around in my mind for a few minutes, I decided that it did have a more etheric sound in this verse, so I went with it.

NOTE: If you do not have a g-blogger ID, please sign your comments, so that I will know some one stopped by besides anonymous.

Thanks -VCW

Dreamku Haiga - Ink Blots #3

This is my favorite and closest to the dream vision from which the dreamku came.