last night's dreaming

1.
an eccentric woman gives my sister and i
a series of questions. she says we must

lock ourselves in a a 7 inch high box the
width and length of our bodies, and

stay in until we answer the questions
after which there will be some element

of reward. i prepare nervously with
my sister, and worry that this will

take time away from important
work assignments. we take a train in

to a station where we find the boxes
as well as my parents, both of them,

there to encourage us.

there are other students of these
questions preparing themselves too -

it's a competition, and the questions
are koans, about pop musicians.

2.

immediately i freak out

with anxiety. aware that this is a competition
and time is an element, and wanting to get

back to work, and noticing that another
student finishes within moments

i begin to cry. a teacher comes to help me
but i can't stop crying, frantically,

self-indulgently, excessively. others
are being assisted. i reject assistance.

i scream despairingly "that first student
was asian - unfair advantage!" knowing

with those words i'm swinging my angry
fists blindly in the dark.

i know the only road to an answer is
release of the body, and time in the box, and

the end of measuring that time. and i know
that i can do this, so certainly that it isn't

even a question. but these people, this
tension, this energy, this competition

it freezes me, brings me to frenzy,
bring me to self-indulgent tears.

3.

i wake up a little, and the more i wake up,
the more i know i need to let my body

naturally follow its course of forgetting
time, and sleeping in.