My Friend Tells Me Her Dream On a Camping Trip
My friend’s favorite pastime is gardening,
mine is writing poems.
I’ve told her I hate poems that begin with dreams
because no one really cares.
After shaking the dew from our chairs
and settling into our morning coffee,
she starts. Her uncle killed a bison
in Yellowstone while the family vacationed.
Strange she was with her cousins
and even stranger it was with a bow and arrow,
not a gun. So much blood spurted
from the bison’s side and then suddenly she
heard the geyser gurgling, spitting
filling the sky. She and the family rushed
to see it, leaving the uncle behind.
I don’t ask her to say more.
By noon, we’re hours into a hike
and she says to me, My uncle
is actually my father and
I am the bison. I wonder what I do
with that. It’s just a dream but
it’s still a serious allegation.
If I were a real friend,
I’d ask: What did he do to you?
I buy time and say, Things can
get mixed up in dreams, like
we can taste a blossoming apple tree,
the scent of hibiscus can sit on our tongues.
Keep pondering, I say.
At dusk, light splits among the trees
and I place our chairs by the fire.
I’d really like to talk about my upcoming trip
cruising the Danube this fall
or how my oldest daughter wants to have a child.
The sausages begin to sizzle and spit
in the pan over the open fire. We pass the whiskey
back and forth. I sense she’s thinking about the dream.
I ask, Do you know if the bison lived?
She tells me it died, but since she appeared in the dream,
it reaffirms I have forgiven my father, she says.
Late into the night, we talk about other things:
how we find ourselves time-bent, happy
not to be alone, a bit tired, grateful for some friends
and family, and the dog snoring at our feet.
Yvonne Higgins Leach
Yvonne Higgins Leach is the author of a poetry collection In the Spaces Between Us (Kelsay Books 2024). Her first collection Another Autumn was published by Cherry Grove Collections in 2014. She spent decades balancing a career in communications and public relations, raising a family, and pursuing her love of writing poetry. Her latest passion is working with shelter dogs. She splits her time living on Vashon Island and in Spokane, Washington. For more information, visit www.yvonnehigginsleach.com