A Dream of Colony

From "Colony"

I dreamed we came to an iron gate.

And leaned against it.

It opened.

We heard it grinding slowly over gravel.

We began to walk.

When we started talking

I saw our words had the rare power

to unmake history:

Gradually the elms beside us

shook themselves into leaves.

And laid out under us their undiseased shadows.

Each phrase of ours,

Holding still for a moment in the stormy air,

raised an unburned house

at the end of an avenue of elder and willow.

Unturned that corner

the assassin eased around the aimed from.

Undid. Unsaid:

Once. Fire. Quick. Over there.

The scarred granite healed in my sleep.

The thundery air became sweet again.

We had come to the top of the avenue.

I heard laughter and forgotten consonants.

I saw greatcoats and epaulettes.

I turned to you—

But who are you?

Before I woke I heard a woman’s voice cry out.

It was hoarse with doubt.

She was saying,

I was saying—

What have we done?