20 Feb California Dreamin’

Bit of an unorthodox blog entry I realise so if you’re opposed to poetry here is a quick summary: San Francisco is a dream itself – exciting, confusing, joyous, dark etc. In my apartment, my roommates and I all have strange and vivid dreams which is essentially the idea behind the blog post and I detail one dream I had and how it related to an unfortunate event which occurred in the Tenderloin. Also, excuse the lack of photo but hopefully you’ll be satisfied by The Mamas and The Papas.

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Moving to San Francisco has been but a dream.

I wander mindlessly through crowded streets

And greet the faces I am to meet

With wandering eyes and flashing teeth,

Keeping to the shuffle of my feet.

To pinch is no use, no use at all

Nor to holler, yell or call.

I am sleeping sweetness, salt and sick

I have seen the candle burn to its wick.

Yet the ceased flame is still flickering.

Time ceases tickering.

A fog circles discretely

Before lingering sweetly,

And nestles on my chamber floor,

Tapping with its hardened claw.

This house bears bones of persons’ past,

With bony fingers each die is cast

Plucking a spectre from their breast

As the waning moon falls to a crest.

That eve, in fitful fury, there was a vision

Brought on by a slimy apparition

And in between my bated breaths

My soul sunk into watery depths.

My body tortured, cut and skewed

Left upon the floor as a meaty slough.

Aware of my dismembered limbs

In vain, I wept, and filled the river to its brim.

Waking with sweat on my back and brow

A bird flees from the willow’s bough

And my body a puzzle glued as one

Yet someone, somewhere has had their fun –

In a suitcase on a corner a man sits,

Cut and quartered into haggard bits.

His blood, soaking the concrete slabs,

Dries into black, anchored scabs.

For the root of man is ruined

By a madman disillusioned.

Was it he who infected my very soul?

Or did I, with such visions (without revision),

Allow this bastard to be befouled?

Am I him, or he me

In some universe otherworldly?

Please pardon me for such poetic nonsense

But I have just this one defence:

We are true visions of one dream

Converging into one woven, turbid stream.