Spin the wheel and I'm a king reborn

[sovay]

For the last few weeks, I have not been dreaming at all. Or I have been waking up with a sense of absent time, but no intervening memories, which I find more disconcerting than nightmares. But a few nights ago, I dreamed I was up in the mountains at a cross between a university and a sort of scientists' commune with an older person of completely indeterminable gender—whichever they dressed as, they looked more like the opposite; both or neither, I never asked—and a soldier named Lev who did not use to be human. He made me think sometimes of a fisher; he looked as though he should have been crouching among pine branches when he was only folding his arms on a concrete-walled overlook. Whatever he reminded me of, it was lithe and untrusting and tightly wound, faintly amused at his own tension. I never asked him, either. I remember a ski lift over an autumn forest, children below with a dog that looked more like a dire wolf. As soon as I woke up, I felt a lot better about my brain. (This even after I realized it had probably just presented me with a sleep-deprived mashup of Skin Horse and X-Men.) Then the night before last, I dreamed of a boy named Alexandria. We were not in Ostia Naye; ostensibly it was the sixth century CE, except there were too many computers. I can recapture none of the plot, but the mise-en-scène was grainfields and a kind of dome-and-ziggurat skyline, books like old ivy in the dry stones of a wall. An illuminated manuscript version of The Gammage Cup is not the weirdest object I have ever dreamed about, but it's certainly memorable. And last night, I dreamed about disaster sites and choristers like professional mourners and a girl who was posing as one of the dead. This may be brain-static, but it makes me much more comfortable than night after night with a dead-black screen. Also, I have a better chance of getting fiction out of it.

On that note: copies of Sybil's Garage #6, containing my poem "Σκιαδάς" and a shout-out to Consonant, are now available! I have not yet received one myself, but the table of contents is a thing of great promise. I like the scarecrow at the subway station, too. I'm a little surprised one of those has never showed up in my dreams.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

ostensibly it was the sixth century CE, except there were too many computers. :-)

Both your soldier, lithe and untrusting and tightly wound, faintly amused at his own tension, and your ambiguously gendered person would be interesting characters. I like the notion of someone who is faintly amused at his own tension.

P.S. I'm going to order that Sybil's Garage--it has lots of interesting-looking stuff in it.

[handful-ofdust.livejournal.com]

I keep forgetting to congratulate you on the sell-out success of your book, because I suck, so...congratulations! And on this placement, too. And all forthcoming placements.;)

BTW, the funny thing about Splashdown's "Karma Slave" is that I actually had a copy of that once before, though it was deleted in the great iPod crash of whatever. To make matters even weirder, I got it off the Titan A.E. soundtrack.

[ap-aelfwine.livejournal.com]

Fascinating dreams, these. I'm sorry for the disconcerting feeling in the weeks previous.

I wanted a pet dire wolf as a child, for some reason. (Today I'd rather have a chalicothere.)

An illuminated manuscript version of The Gammage Cup is not the weirdest object I have ever dreamed about, but it's certainly memorable.

Fascinating idea, that. I'd not thought of that book in years.

I don't often remember dreams for very long after I wake. Reading about yours helps make up for that, slightly.

[vr-trakowski.livejournal.com]

Gracious, I'd love to see an illustrated manuscript of The Gammage Cup. Are you aware that there's a sequel? The Whisper of Glocken isn't quite as good, but it's still interesting.