The following is a writing exercise that involves making a new poem or story from a combination of a
dream-state and a prompted imagination using a method somewhat like self-hypnosis. A link to the exercise is above.
The door is nothing special, except for the vibrance of its blue color.
With painter’s tape, I’d lined its window and trim. A freshly shaken can of royal blue satin paint sits patiently within reach, awaiting application. The once fuchsia color, like dirty, uncleared plates in a restaurant, is a remnant of the previous owner. I prefer clearing out the past to make room for the present and future.
I’ve thought about replacing the brass finger-like protrusion handle that’s nothing like a regular knob. But I haven’t, so instead of twisting it as a motorcycle handle, I push it down toward the floor.
The door swings open too quickly, and I brace myself for its inevitable slam but wince my eyes open when it doesn’t. I walk over the threshold and notice the knowns of the entryway and dining room are now empty spaces.
Pinks, blues, purples, and greens cast prisms through the space as though it were the sun shining through stained glass windows. Where the colors touch, plant life springs forth; their color is unlike any I’ve seen.
Vines and branches twist into existence and their leaves grow larger than cars; the vegetation fills the space. And it hits me, the sweetness of cotton candy mixed with dampened dirt and oxygenated air. With each inhale, roots within me tether me into this space until I am no longer separate.
I move across the space. And then again. By simply thinking and feeling, I move swiftly around it.
A gentle whisper comes, “woo-woo-woo,” it’s barely audible, like a helicopter far in the distance. A dragonfly-like creature grows closer and then touches down on my fingers—four torsos, each with a set of iridescent wings. In an instant, its visibility, its surveillance-like set of eyes, are my own.
I see microscopic prisms and fractal prisms that make it impossible to discern if I am me or it, but there isn’t time. A terrifying screech and talons descend as my opposite hand snaps instinctively over the insect to protect it. Or is it me?
The action of covering transforms the space into a mound of earth, the center of which is hollow. Inside it, the air is chilled, and the colors are muted browns and greens. I am safer, I think; however, a piece of paper with bold lettering sits on a decaying wooden fence that says. “It’s not what you think.”
A mossy clearing materializes, and inch-size figures move around with the busyness of ants. Without body or physicality, I move the lens of my being closer and closer, like the aperture of a camera, until it’s fully zoomed.
“Stack it, move it, unload it.” The community is one giant organism, individually and collectively, using a hive-like mind. My attention to it, fuels it with consciousness. Then, as though it’s a recently rubbed genie, the organism speaks.
“You have come far.” A million voices resonant as one, and I feel affirmation.
“What is it that you now seek?” I reflect on the world’s brilliant vegetation, the dragonfly’s vision, and the inner earth refracting wisdom of ages as the bustling of the individual parts ceases.
I wither like an untended plant.
“It’s natural as the sprouting of a seed. Tend to the feeling, and you will do fine here. Go now.”
And I do.
Thanks for stopping by. Love, Jaclynn
Going On 40 