Rough and Smooth

by Mike Pacey

Jan 7, 1857: I can remember when very young I used to have a dream night after night, over and over, which might have been named Rough and Smooth.  All existence, satisfaction and dissatisfaction, all event symbolized in this way.  I seemed to be lying and tossing, on a horrible, rough surface, which must soon, put an end to my existence, though even in the dream I knew it to be the symbol merely of my misery; then suddenly, I was lying on a delicious smooth surface, as of a summer sea, of gossamer or down or softest plush, and life such a luxury to live.  My waking experience always is such an alternate Rough and Smooth.  In other words it is Insanity and Sanity.

In childhood, again and again, I too had this dream.
Even recently, suffering a fever — half asleep, half awake —
it returned . . . I’m lying face-up on the ocean
flat and polished as a sheet of glass.  All is still, silent.
Slowly, two ripples set off from opposite shores.
Inexorably, they meet with a crash,
and subside.  Peace returns . . .
Then two bigger waves approach each other, collide.
Larger and larger whitecaps slam together.
In minutes, my brain’s engulfed in a roiling sea:
twisted mass of choppy water.  The surface agitated;
my own agitation heightens, inescapable.
Flung about in bed — sheets drenched, heavy.

Visual and auditory cues recur
but the overwhelming essence is tactile:
where once the sea inside’s soft, even,
now all’s sharp and jagged.  For years, I kept
this nightmare to myself; then one night,
sensing imminence — mom tucking me in —
I told her about this battle in my head. ! ! !
Two armies, face to face, tensed for combat.
She stroked my forehead, tried to calm me
by saying war’s terrible, everyone’s afraid of war.
Often I wanted to share it with others,
write it out, but was afraid.
Then I read Thoreau’s Journal;
no longer alone on this brittle, inconstant ocean.