Variation on a Theme

In my dream I am with a little animal no bigger than the top joint of my finger, a cute little bunny-like creature with black furless ears that curl back over his shoulders. He hops into mischief at every turn, and I try to cage him -- for his safety and my peace of mind, I tell myself. But he is a shape shifter, and all my best efforts fail. He grows tiny and sneaks through the cracks or he grows large and pushes off the lids. By the end of the dream I am completely exhausted, and I realize it cannot be done. I climb into waking consciousness realizing I cannot contain him.

Later I find him again in the imaginal realm. He is sitting on the back of my living room sofa staring up toward the ceiling. He gathers himself, ready to spring away as I draw near.

I hold still. "Why must you be so hasty?" I ask. "I am only trying to keep you safe."

Suddenly roots grow from his feet, tearing apart my sofa and the floor beneath it -- muscle roots with long greedy tendrils. They thrust into the ground beneath my crawl space, plunging deep. A tree grows up from them, a great bark-knotted trunk pushing aside tables and lamps as it expands into the living room, growing branches that rip through my ceiling and the roof above and then divide and replicate in a million tiny fingers which each grows a leaf -- two or three leaves -- as I watch. A vast green canopy expands over my broken home.

I am speechless, gaping. It dawns on me that what I am seeing is very beautiful.

The leaves flutter, puff out a cloud of blue and yellow butterflies.

"Ok," I finally manage, "I guess you don't really need anybody to keep you safe."

The tree grows a pair of eyes, close to the ground. They glitter in the early morning light. They become great crystals. I see myself reflected in a thousand facets, and in each reflection I am anxious and worrying.

At first I am offended. But -- what can I say? "Yes," I acknowledge. "That is me."

The tree grows branches that reach for me. It's leaves fill the morning with wind song. I allow myself to be carried up into the bright dance of greens and blues, yellows and russets. I feel myself unraveling. Instinctively I reach to hold my atoms together. "Not again," I moan. Leaf songs soothe me. I grow blind with the chili pepper taste of sunlight on my tongue. I float into darkness and timelessness.

Later I am lying on my side on what is left of the floor in my living room. The tree is gone. The tiny shape shifter sits in front of me, where I can see him without moving.

"I don't get it," I tell him. "Are you saying I still cannot plan my life, tie anything down?"

He shows me movies, dozens of people making decisions. In each case something important that they could not know about happens just after they have chosen a course of action. In each case it would have been so much better -- for them or for the world -- had they not yet decided. In each case avenues are closed off, potentials snuffed out.

I groan. "That is the nature of human existence. That ALWAYS happens."

He watches me, nose twitching.

I sigh. Once again I give in. "Ok." And then, "How will I know?"

I will know. Suddenly that is the one thing I am most certain of: I will know.