I am wide-awake at 1 a.m.
and I have just awoken from a dream,
in which crows and seagulls were at war with each-other
outside my bedroom window- in the sky, on the ground,
fighting for the air, the rooftops, the food to be found;
I dreamt that the crows and the seagulls were in the throws
of aerial-combat of the speed, manoeuvrability, and ferocity,
of a World War II dogfight- darting, swooping,
and attacking like winged-warriors of black and white.

4 a.m. and I am awake again.
I decide to read a book,
then I listen to some music,
then I return to my book again.
I am restless. The sun has yet to rise.
I get out of bed and decide to make myself a cup of tea-
the rooms of my home are dark, but I know this house so well
that I no longer need to rely on my eyes
to find what I can’t at first see.
I can’t remember what I was dreaming about before I woke up this time;
if I recall correctly I felt like I was still awake,
but I was definitely still dreaming-
the world looked familiar, but it didn’t make sense;
everything around me was something I felt a connection to,
but it was as if they were not mine.

Seven o’clock in the morning. I open my eyes, I close them again,
and then I open them wide, wondering whether I am awake, dreaming,
or in-between places, and I look again at my surroundings to be my guide.
Before I awoke, I dreamed that I was walking the streets of a bustling city-
not knowing where I was going, but that I had somewhere to be.
The city was full of people that I knew well,
I felt like I was walking through a memory-
everything seemed so detailed, real, clear.
I could have been dreaming, I could have been awake-
at first, it was hard to tell.
I was walking across an open square, with people standing around talking
and people sitting on benches conferring with each-other,
and no one was looking at me.
I tried to say something, but I couldn’t make a sound;
I looked to my feet and saw a notebook and a pen lying on the ground.
I picked up the pen and started to write what I wanted to say in the book,
and I realised that the notebook was already full of words and thoughts
written in blue ink and written in what looked like my hand-writing
but scattered in all directions- as if they had been shook.
Then I looked up and everyone who was looking the other way
was now watching me;
one of the women sitting on a nearby bench stood up and approached me
and took the red notebook our of my hand, closed it,
and then gave it back to me.
I was confused, disorientated,
but I wanted to know why she had just done that-
so I approached the woman who had returned to her seat,
and then I saw that she was sitting next to and talking to someone
who looked exactly like me.
I looked down at my “other-self”
to make certain I was seeing who I was seeing,
and then my other-self turned his head to look up at me,
and with a smile and a nod of his head
my dream disappeared in a flash of light
and I was opening my eyes, closing them, and opening them again.

In the morning light, as I stare out my window at the outside world,
so bright and beautiful and cloaked for now in silence,
I feel that things are not what they seem.
I get dressed, I make myself a cup of tea,
and then I muse to myself about the things that happen in between dreams.

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