The Dream I Had to Write About

I have held onto this for longer than I care to admit, but I once had a dream so unsettling, so deeply visceral, that upon waking up from it, I was immediately compelled to write about it. Yet, when I wrote it down, it came out in this way, vague and full of questions. Do you have the answers, dear reader?

I saw his face on the news,

over and over on every station

after he disappeared.

But they didn’t know his real name.

He volunteered, hero-like.

Had a debt to pay

he didn’t save someone once.

I knew his real name.

He was her student,

but more than her student.

She was catatonic after he didn’t come back.

It was dangerous,

she pretended not to know.

She would be famous.

But did he kill that girl?

No one took it seriously

turned it into a punch-line, a silly children’s game.

Then someone painted a mural on the gym wall,

in gory detail,

I screamed and screamed,

had to be dragged away.

I screamed in front of another boy

dark hair, dark eyes, sad heart.

He knew his real name, too.

I called him, but he did not answer…