Others were sitting in the chairs, easy, relaxed, men and
women, I knew them but I don’t know who they were by
name, now or then, and I have a big knife, a huge sharp knife,
and very slowly I walked up to the first one and I slowly slit
her throat. No one moves or notices and I walk to the next
one and I slit her throat, and I walk to the next one and I slit
his throat, and slowly I walked around the circle of sitting
people and I slit each throat slowly and purposefully. I wake
up shaking and screaming, burning hot, in terror. In the dream
I was truly happy.
Or I dream the dream I hate most, that I am awake, I see
the room, someone is in it, I hear him, he has a knife, I wake
up, I try to scream, I can’t scream, I am awake, I believe I am
awake, but I cannot scream and I cannot move, my eyes are
open, I can see and hear everything but I cannot do anything, I
keep trying to scream but I make no sound, I cannot move, so
I think I must not be awake, and I force myself to wake up
and it turns out that I wasn’t awake before but I am now, and
I hear the man in the room, and I can see him moving around,
and I am awake, and I try to scream but no sound comes out
and I try to move but I cannot move, but I am awake, and I
see everything and I hear everything, every detail of the room I
know I am in, every sound that I know is there, every detail of
reality, the time, the sounds of the neighbors, I know where I
i i 3
am and who I am and that I am awake and still I can’t say
anything, I try to scream but I can’t, the vocal cords do not
work, the voice does not work, my mouth works but no sound
comes out, and I try to force myself to get up but my body
does not move, and then I realize that even though I think I
am awake I must not be awake and so I force myself to wake
up, I fight and I fight to wake up, and then I wake up, and I
hear the man in the room, I see him, I see his face, I see him
and see every detail of who he is and how he is dressed and
how he moves and where he goes and I see myself and I know
I am in bed and he is in the room and I hear every sound and I
try to scream but I cannot and I try to move but I cannot and
so I try to force myself again to wake because I know I must
be asleep and I am so terrified I cannot move from fear and I
cannot scream from fear: and by the time I wake up I am half
dead. Drenched in sweat, I try to sleep some more.
I hear my love, my friend, moving around, awake, alive. I
am relieved. The night is over. I can begin to try to sleep. I
hear him turn on the water, he is there if it floods. I have left
him a note, probably two pages long, filled with worries and
admonitions: what must be done to get through this day
coming up, the vivid imperatives that came to press in on my
