Pillow Talk

She sat up in bed, as she often does, and started talking in her sleep. Usually, her conversations are with her students, ranging anywhere from four to six years of age and just as unruly in her dreams as they must be during the day.

"Everyone has to get in line before we go out," she'll explain in the darkness. I simply lay there and watch her act out the entire scene with the invisible children running around her.

At times, Vicki will even get out of bed and continue to talk to the ghost-children, and I have to admit, there is an element of eeriness as the scene continues to develop with her walking across the room and arriving at the door. However, at that moment, she'll awake and stand still in the doorway; silhouetted by the light we leave on at the top of the stairs. Then, a sigh can be heard as she turns to the glass of water she left on her dresser and takes loud gulps from it before returning to bed.

But tonight, it was something new.

Neck pain was keeping me from falling into an easy sleep, and after a couple of hours, I simply gave up and began to consider making my bed on one of the recliners downstairs. That very moment, my wife sat up and looked at me with eyes wide and an expression on her face I hadn't seen since we first met - a look that one gives to another when they meet them for the first time and are happy to make the acquaintance.

"Hi! Here's the window; what were you thinking to put in it?"

"What window?" I answered looking into her eyes, but she wasn't looking into mine. I mean, she was, but in her dream, she saw another face.

"Over here," she looked over to the open window on her side and pulled back the curtain to reveal the nighttime sky. "You said that you had some interesting shapes you wanted to put in it."

"No, no shapes."

She turned and looked at me again, but this time her expression faded and resumed its tired look as the dream melted into reality. I instantly regretted not coming up with something for the window and maintaining her dream. Our interaction, as brief as it was, was amazing in its sense of freshness - like I had traveled back in time to a point where I was new to her again. But that moment was gone.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"Yes." She reclined back onto the bed and fell back to sleep, facing the open window.

New Moon Rose

There's no gift in a rose
One chases in the dark
Or in the midst of its petals
Worth tripping over.

So dance if you want
But your spell won't bind
I am blind to the twists
That no longer seduce...

If we were ever one
It was when we were both
Sooted spirits running
Under a new moon - crying.