The Nightly Visitation

By John Grey

My mother said
"You must not forget this dream"
but all I can remember
is her saying that.

 

Whatever the content
of last night's sleep,
it dissipated with first light,
first rub of my eyes.

 

Not knowing what she told me,
and working it into my life,
could doom me
to a hideous hereafter

 

Or it could be like
those ancient warnings,
"Don't forget your handkerchief
when even without that rag

 

stashed inside my pocket,
no car hit, no lightning struck.
Could be that mothers lecture
as a matter of course

 

and death doesn't stop them.
Whether at the door as I go out
or in the depths of my head
when I'm sleeping,

 

it's never I love you,
it's always lack of forethought
doesn't.

Published July 2007