Profound Dream: I need interpretation
I just joined this site and it looks pretty awesome. This is my first post and I was uncertain where to put it so I settled on general. This post is about a dream I had last year. I am an amateur writer so I recorded it as a short story. The story is 95% accurate to the dream; there were a few little things I had to add for clarity but it is 100% accurate in the major aspects. Here it is. Any interpretations would be much appreciated.
Dream on November 2
A train whistle bellows eerily in the distance. The autumn foliage blurs into yellows and oranges that are caught by my peripheral vision through the open side windows of my truck. I am on my way home from somewhere; not remembering, knowing, or caring for my senses are full. Brisk air wisps through the hair on my arm; a hurricane on my skin. Sunlight blinks in blotches through the dissipated canopy lining the sides of the road. They are like gunshots directed by a snipers aim on my pupils. The road is familiar, a path beaten under the truck many times before. I do not even have to think about driving for it is automatic on the known road. I can let my mind wander, wallow in the sensory input, loose itself in visions.
Jolted out of this relaxation I am astounded. I see in the small vibrating rectangle of the rearview mirror a policeman on a motorcycle. Amazingly he races up behind me and bumps my truck again with his front tire. I am astounded. The policeman’s mouth is a thin line of non-expression. He races by on my left in the sharp blind curve and pulls ahead. Amazement transforming into thick rage I press the pedal to the floor. I pull aside the cop and point and yell for him to stop. Surprisingly he complies. We pull to the side of the road and I leap out of my truck, mad energy propelling my feet.
“What in the world were you doing!? Are you crazy!? I want your badge number, plate number, everything. You are not getting away with this.”
I stare at the officer, a look of complete pacifism and acceptance transfixed upon his face.
“Okay. Follow me to my partner’s car parked down the road aways and I’ll get you what you need.”
I am speechless at his lack of protest. I follow the offending officer as we walk down the pavement to his partner’s car. We reach the car and the officer rummages through papers and folders, taking several minutes. Meanwhile traffic has increased on the usually quiet roadway. And in unusual form. They are all antique cars and trucks; the kind you would find at a car show. Cherry red Chevelles, shiny black 50’s pickups, antique Harley Davidsons; all pass by in succession as I wait on the officer.
After a few more moments the policeman hands me all the information I want and we start walking back to our vehicles. Curiously I hear muffled music in the distance. I increase my pace wanting to know what is going on around the bend. After we round the blind curve it is like we step into another world. All the vehicles that had passed by have set up as a car show here on and alongside the road. The beautiful cars are lined up and glint in the late evening sun. A circus tent is set up and they are playing 50’s music loudly. Children pass by, mouths blue or pink stained by cotton candy. Dads lean over to peer into the windows of the show cars. The policeman and I reach the spot where our vehicles were left. The space is now occupied by a polished blue and white Corvette. I look at the officer questioningly. He replies.
“Well we both left the keys in the ignitions. They probly just moved ‘em so they could set up.”
“Okay, but where to ya think?”
“Well, only place around here they could park ‘em off the road would be down there under the bridge at the old plant.”
“Plant?”
“Just follow me.”
We walk back through the car show, our feet pounding on the pavement, turn back through the curve and walk toward the bridge. The light is fading as the sun sets behind the autumn mountains.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Taking the dirt road that leads to the gully traversed by the bridge, our feet crunch in the gravel and dry tire tracks. Toward the head of the small valley an abandoned industrial plant resides. I don’t know how long I’ve lived here, but I didn’t know about this place that I’ve passed by almost on a daily basis. As the cop and I get closer to the plant we see our vehicles parked neatly side by side in the dirt lot in the plant’s shadow.
There is also a small campfire built on the ground and glowing in the dusk air.
When we reach the vehicles, the officer opens a saddlebag, removes some clothing, and walks behind one of the sprawling buildings to change attire. I get in my truck, the seat cold against my body from the cool evening air. I start the engine and let it idle to warm up, staring blankly from the seat across the pond that sits in front of the plant. The officer startles me by suddenly poking his head in the window.
“Hey, shut that off for a minute. I want to show you something.”
“Show me what?”
“Just shut it off. You gotta see this.”
As I notice the evil grin residing on his face I also notice the stark change that had occurred in him since he had changed out of uniform. He could be somebody’s friend now.
I shut the truck off and clamber out. I walk slowly around the truck, not seeing where he went. I come upon him kneeling down beside his laid over motorcycle. He has removed one of the hard saddlebags and has the gas cap off the tank, pouring gasoline into the container.
My curiosity stimulated, I follow him to the foot of the largest building in this abandoned industrial place, and begin up some metal stairs. We climb to the top, maybe five stories, ten turns on the stairwell. There is a large round silo here, perhaps 10 feet across, with a light metal lid that lies off to one side. A small ladder leads down and inside the large tube. The policeman carefully sprinkles all the gas down into the silo, remembering to take a rag and soak it as the ignition device. He slides the metal top over the top and looks at me.
“Hey, you got a lighter?”
“Yeah.”
I hand him the lighter and we wait for several minutes.
“What are we waiting for?”
“You have to let the fumes fill the whole thing to get the biggest effect.”
“Oh.”
After he is satisfied with the time elapsed, he kicks the lid off the top, lights the rag and throws it down the neck of the silo.
Time slows, a whole second seeming a month, but then comes back in an explosion of ferocity. Standing back at a safe distance on the grate metal platform circling the large tube, my eyes widen at the site of a flaming man blown out of the silo in the explosion.
“You killed somebody!”
“Yeah.”
“You knew a homeless man was in there.”
“Yeah. Follow me back down.”
I walk behind the policeman, tramping down the metal stairs, each step creating a metal clang, a ringing sound. The sound reverberates against the metal hull of the plant and vibrates the membrane of my eardrum. The sound transforms to a crunching as we transition to gravel. I watch my feet, too confused to look up. Each separate gravel seems to be a world of its own, a meteor floating on the transparent ground, hurling me on their backs toward some unknown destination of emotionless freedom.
“Hey.”
“Huh?”
“Hey, you still with me? You looked pretty blank there for a minute.”
“Yeah. I’m okay, just thinking.”
I had unknowingly followed this guy to another silo opening, this one however resided underground, its gut under the earth with only its mouth protruding out. There was a worn path to the side of it that held the ladder, and I knew the inevitable.
The cop was back at his motorcycle refilling the saddlebag with gasoline and I watch from behind my eyes as he walks back toward me, toward the victims under that lid. He repeats his procedure just as before. This time however there are voices of protest from below. A sound identifying humanity.
The fire is lit, and there are screams, screams that reverberate within the empty husk of my body, bouncing from wall to wall within my soul. I see the smoke seething from around the edges of the lip and I know that it is all over for the hopeless soul within. Curiously I am moved but not shaken or thrown down by my emotions. It seems I have adopted this policeman’s attitude, that strange aura of violent pacifism and fatal acceptance.
The small campfire that was burning earlier nearby on the ground is still glowing but the flames have died. I sit down next to it and cross my legs while I stare into the embers. The cop crosses my vision periodically as he walks back and forth searching and compiling more firewood. After a small blaze is lit, he sits across from me, mirroring my position. I look at him through the distortion of the heat rising from the fire. The image is blurred, then clear, then blurry once again. We sit in silence in the black night for several moments. There is no sound except for the crackling embers in the heat. He gets up once more and goes back to the motorcycle, again filling the saddlebag with the flame liquid.
While he is facing away and crouched low to the earth the policeman’s voice sounds projected from another time or dimension.
“Can I see your keys a sec bud?”
I have no idea why, but I do not protest.
“Sure. Lemme get ‘em.”
I walk to the truck and retract the keys from the ignition. The policeman is standing now, holding the saddlebag full of gas in one hand and I place the keys in his other. I remain where I am and watch as he goes back over near the campfire. To my amazement he slowly, ritually raises the container of gas over his head. Tipping it slightly, the liquid cascades over his face and shoulders. As he increases the angle of the container, it becomes a torrent of shimmering glass baptizing his body. He stands there dripping, seeming to breath the vapors of his demise into the last corners of his lungs, my keys dangling loosely from one of his fingers. With fierce action the keys are grasped tightly by his fist as he methodically raises a dripping foot closer to the flames of the fire. Stray drops fall into the fire and make tiny explosions upon the burning wood. A flame licks up suddenly and catches a soaked shoe. Instantly the policeman is engulfed.
He stands motionless for what seems like an eternity and then whips the hot keys from his hand at me. I stoop to pick these from the ground but when my flesh contacts the small metal implements, I instantly retract my hand from their hot bite. I remain stooped over, not wanting to witness the scene above my head. I hear the incessant roaring of the flames leaping over the standing man’s body and see the yellow glow about my feet. Suddenly I hear the pounding of feet, the same a running man would make, and I look up with a jerk. He is racing toward the pond. With a leap he dives into the cold surface of the water. The recently risen moon reflects its image upon the rippling surface of the pond, illuminating the charred and steaming floating body. A soft breeze reaches its hand down and gently beseeches the body toward the center of the pond. Lying face down on the surface of the liquid, the wisps of steam from its back trace toward the opposite shore.
I sit down once again next to the fire, the keys are at my side and I pick them up; they are cooled by the night’s air. I stare into the embers once more, curiously saddened by all that I had witnessed. There is no anger at the policeman, no tears for the murdered, just a generic sadness residing in my throat. Time no longer means anything, just the small flames gently embracing the remains of the firewood. I sit entranced by their side, their presence all the companionship I need at the moment.
I don’t know how long I sat like this but the flames are gone when I realize there is a glowing white light peeking into my peripheral vision. I ignore it at first, thinking it only the moon risen to a new angle that focuses its reflection off the surface of the pond onto my face. But as it grows in intensity my curiosity is aroused and I break my vision off the embers. The pond is illuminated from the bottom, a great ball of white light is pulsing at its center, causing the water to glow in blue-white iridescence. Suddenly the ball bursts forth from beneath the pond’s surface and leaps toward the sky. It reminds me of a nebula, a gaseous condensed cloud, swirling blue and white. The nebula transitions its form, it is a great blue and white dragon, now it is a beautiful angel, now back to the nebula. From its position high in the sky, it swoops down and hovers at my side. This nebula invokes in me an overwhelming sense of love toward it. I reach toward God as if I am on the chapel ceiling.
We are walking together now on the floor of the pond, while the blue-white light shadows dance across the soft dimpled mud. The cold water envelops every shard of my body. Discarded machinery litters the bottom; normally an image of decay, they fill me with joy, as if symbols of life. I look down at my feet to see what is tickling my leg; they are bubbles released from the mud by my step. My vision fixates on a particular one and I watch it bobble up. Momentarily it catches and holds in a down turned fold in my shirt. It rests a moment near my chest, almost touching the skin through the fabric, and then it continues its journey to the surface. I realize suddenly that I need air, the very substance contained in that sphere. Panic erases the elation, the amazement and awe are gone instantly. I try to swim up, toward life, toward air, but the nebula still holds me magnetically. I turn and look at it directly, projecting fear through my expression. Seeming to understand, it releases me from its powerful grasp. I frantically stroke toward the surface, grateful this pond is relatively shallow.
Gasping at the surface, my famished lungs devour the life. Swimming toward the nearest bank, I clamber unto an ice shelf clumsily and lie prostrate on its frozen surface, the blue-white glow now gone.
(Sorry the spacing got a little messed up when I pasted it. Hope it didnt
distract.)
thx for the replies; it opened new doors
Thank you for the reply. It opened new paths to be explored and opened my eyes for what seems the true interp for myself. Here's what I came up with:
Policeman = society, government
Homeless men = average man murdered by class, rulers
God being blue/white nebula = vanity of blue/white corvette; it will rust, corrode, die
My apathy, inaction toward the atrocious deeds of the policeman = my apathy, inaction, cowardice toward all this
Fire = intensity of emotions of this revelation
Ice = the end result; may not be warm and comfortable but it is the truth
Angel/dragon metamorphosis = my own polarity, being raised conservative Baptist then educated in science - the only true physical truth
The end: the policeman is my fear and yet friend. He abuses me and yet shows me the truth. (Society is a mistake and yet the answer can be found from its mistakes)
The policeman's actions: Society murders the underprivileged with no sympathy.
God in the pond: He pulls me and loves me as I do him but in the end I am left on an ice shelf. Representing the end result of a belief in God: cold truth that it is a lie.
