Dream Chair

Vivid turquoise, the dream chair waits
against a wall of graffiti. No one sits
there, but behind it, a time traveler,
clings to the chair back, her face blurred
by an unknown gravity.

Centered between the sturdy green chair
legs, her own shins descend, and her feet
are anchored in a blue and turquoise tide
that ebbs and flows across the crazy
wavy floorboards.

Held captive, she has painted her toenails—
a gesture meant to ground the memory
of who she is as her face keeps shifting,
the speed of her travel recasting it like
a sand sculpture destined to dissolve.

I’ve never seen the chair in waking life, but
know its house, one I also visit in my dreams—
one whose stone facade is graced with red azalea,
and whose spacious extra bedroom beckons from
the basement where the mural blazes.

I know this room is in that house because the
mural has migrated into this dream, squeezed
itself into a strip where the wall meets the ceiling—
a gaudy rendition of The Last Supper, neon colors
pulsing like a beacon above a painted ankh

Dream Chair

And now I recognize the traveler, remember when
she was afraid to let go—afraid to let time sweep her
toward the quantum chair that wants her, its curved
arms extended in welcome, its padded seat the helm
of an immutable ark.