dreaming in straight lines.

once, my dreams were poetic:
delicate webs of metaphor, imagery, intrigue.
they livened my life, waking
and asleep.

and then you happened, and i began
dreaming in straight lines.
i'm not sure why. maybe you
were enough
mystery, metaphor and intrigue.

now, i never dream in freudian--
no repression, no themes,
no delightfully coded discrepencies
between what is latent
and manifest.

now, i dream in real life:
alternate endings
to real events.
resketched characterizations
of real characters.

last night, for instance:

i was at your apartment for the first time,
but our first night didn't happen.
dream-me woke up as real-me couldn't have,
and that night became a catalyst
for nothing.

the dream was succinct and punctuated.
i don't know what happened to my dream-me,
if she knows herself as intimately as I.
if she wonders, two years later:
"what if i had..."

but I like to think she can still dream in
spirals and waves, and she experiences
cubism to my realism,
enlightenment to my dark ages,
and romantic possibility to my cynicism.