Study For My Dream
By Iris Esteban, Wisconsin
Morpheus always shows me the same thing when I go with him.
Just a window.
But each time my perception of it changes.
The window has a frame fighting against time and yellowness.
The window is trapped in a pattern made with grills.
The window is flanked by dead blue curtains.
One day something changes; a woman comes to light.
She wanders to the window and gazes at me.
Suddenly her face swaps; she turns white and squawks.
I wake up. The sound still reverberates in my head.
The loudest and most throbbing sound ever.
It gives me goosebumps.
Curiosity appears on me. What daunted her like that?
I will never know. Morpheus never showed me that again.
I guess it’s not a big deal.
Dreams are just dreams.
Right?
This is an Ekphrastic piece, which means that is based on an artwork. This one is inspired by the artwork “Study for a dream” by Will Barnet. When writing this I didn’t want to limit the poem to what you could see in the artwork, so I decided to write my own version of it. What I see and what I think is happening. I also tried to create a vivid image of it by describing the colors and textures of things.
Writing this Ekphrastic piece was challenging because when I saw the artwork, I saw so many different things that it was hard to put my thoughts in order. But I guess that is what good art does.
