Tall

I don't often do dream poems ... that is, poems about dreams ... simply because I have trouble recalling the dreams when I wake up.

This one was different, though.

I had this sense, as I say in the poem, of actually being taller than John Wayne on his horse. What a feeling that was. I wrote down what I recalled of that feeling.

Then, later ... that's right, pardner ... this one turned into a poem about writing, a subject that I find mysterious and perplexing. Even when the words come together neatly to form a poem, I'm sometimes puzzled as to how that really happened.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I'm not completely baffled by the writing process, but it sometimes seems that poems, in particular, "write themselves," and I can't help expressing some amazement at that.

And now, the poem:

TALL

I dreamed that I
was tall, taller than
John Wayne, taller than
John Wayne on his horse,
and I just stood there
looking tall
and silent,

looking at all those
people looking up
at me, at last,
looking down at them,
but treating them
quietly as equals,

because that's the way

it is with me,
pilgrim,
no matter how tall
I get, nor how many
poems I’ve roped
and led home.

© 2000

(originally published in ByLine)

Today's word: equals