I’ve no problem with relatives,
both living and departed, visiting
my dreams such as last night when
Uncle Fred dropped by my cell
in a Mexican jail and brought
a corned-beef sandwich. Nor is it
a bother when childhood friends
enter my dreams and challenge me
to tetherball at our old elementary.
I even tolerate strangers—
wayward spirits who fly erratically
into my dreams like bats
feeding along a stream.
But phone calls in dreams haunt me—
crackly voices conveying messages
barely comprehensible yet urgent.
I want to shout back at them—This
is a dream, just deliver the message
in person! But my voice is paralyzed—
I can only listen.
I wake
and wonder if there is a dimension
where some spirits are trapped like fish
in small pools when tides recede.
To reach us they must place calls
through a benign galactic operator
who plugs them into a switchboard
of stars and says: Your party
is dreaming—you have one minute.