I am at a meeting of some sort—a convocation, congregation, conventicle, or conference—and the details of this are with me right down to some feeling of name tags. There are tables with white linen. Various seating arrangements. There are many folks I know and a lot more whom I don’t.

At the conclusion of the dream, I’m taking the initiative of cleaning things up, organizing the leftovers in a folksy, congenial, courteous sort of way. At some point in this process, someone sharply reprimands me for allowing portions of the chopped cabbage to be mixed in a cubicle designated for the cucumbers.

I understand this complaint. I even agree with the corrective. But I find myself, beyond myself, continuing to make the same error. And once again I am sharply reprimanded.

At which point I am filled with psychic energies and feel vast forces welling up within me. And I am stunned by the words I am now uttering—words freshly forming and concretizing as my larynx begins to constrict, tongue activates, lips flex. Resolute, wide-eyed, and with the considerable force of my upper body and whole being, I say:

I AM A POET—I SPEAK THE WORLD!

The immediate circumstance comes to a silent stillness.

In my mind I recoil. What did I just say? How could I? What does this mean? What evidence is there?

But there is no impulse whatsoever within me to retract what I have said.

And I wake up.