I dreamt about you again last night
you were not tinted in burnt sienna, flecked with snow
not dead, amid the garbage by the side of the road
not heavy, as when I lifted you up by your legs
carried you across the macadam
to gently place you
beneath a scrubby tree
above the ice-skinned river

I went back after seeing a flash of red
glancing from the soft ditch by the roadside
I was afraid you had been hit
struck down in your carelessness

you bore no marks
you were still shifting worlds
in the lightly falling snow

in my nocturnal escapades
you are the color of snow-filled clouds
of ashes in a fireplace near the end of December
you are light and swift
silently changing from one form to another

I know why you visit me
my time is coming
to fall apart
be sifted through the windy hands of eternity
be spread like grain
to feed the tree I fall beneath

you have shown me
life is trickery

you look directly at me in dreams
like that first day on the river road
your eyes burn, sly flames

during the wakeful drug of everyday
I drowse, lose myself in the tap-tap-tap
float on the flap-flap-flap
of easily-sated hunger and bland desire
shirking off reality

that is why you wander
the back roads of night
waiting to brush your fat, furry tail
against the lazy lull of my neglect
sinking your tiny teeth
into my Achilles tendencies
your last wile
that wakes me from forgetfulness

you entice me
to lift you up and carry you
and lay you down again
with what was before, yet to come