Five Sonnets on Dreaming

Holly M. Wendt, Ph.D.

~After Rupert Brooke

1.

Come autumn, we put the gardens to bed,

Turning gently under spent stems, bare stalks,

Whatever’s left—the leaves already shed

Into bright jewels crackling beneath our walks

Together past the old parts of the year.

Everywhere, though, the promise of the new:

Seed-heads spread, the milkweed down drifting clear,

The maple keys, all paper-winged and spun

To earth. There are few simple joys quite like

Throwing these little propellers up, out,

And watching them descend: there’s time alike

To make a wish and calculate the route:

What path it charts, our next steps, lovely clock

For dreaming what one seed, one key, unlocks.

2.

~with a line after Toni Morrison

She said, and she would know: for those rising

Into positions of trust and power—

Let us dream a little before we think.

Let the dream be large, dreamy, surprising,

In grace and scope; make a tree big enough

To shade everyone who comes, no pruning

It narrow. A dream is a tree, no hedge

Dividing this yard from that. It is such

A great privilege and honor, dream-making:

What is built here builds a future for more.

We, here, are beholden to this ideal,

To nurture each other, firmly staking

A claim to include, and thereby excel.

What we imagine, with care, we do well.

3.

A pelican does not, mythology

Aside, feed her young her own torn breast, slake

Their thirst without thought for her own. Agree,

Though, we are here to give more than we take,

To create what will endure and sustain

Not simply us, not simply now. The bald

Cypress grows despite high water, the pain

Of salt and wind to root and branch, the scald

Of summer; buttressed like a cathedral,

It is an anchor. So, too, a college—

Here, this one, deep-rooted and serving all

Pursuing truth, the arts, science—knowledge

Not for its own sake, but the light it brings,

To lift ourselves, and others, up, like wings.

4.

There is no bridge from dream to plan to life

Save work: hands and minds and hearts together.

When Katrina landed, the need ran rife

Not only to rebuild but re-gather,

Re-see and re-make, remind each other

Of the needs so much greater than our own.

Those needs remain, no matter the weather,

The place, the shape of the disaster. No

Community is exempt. In calmer

Times, too, the call is as strong as ever—

Not to wait until the spotlight’s amber

Points, but seek out new challenges, procure

New allies in action, hear their insight.

We know: with many hands, the work is light.

5.

If we are all the things we’ve ever loved

(Morrison again), our task is easy:

By loving well, loving widely, we prove

Ourselves equal to the work. We increase

Ourselves, become better, more ready for

This world and all it offers. And the world

Is many-leaved, many-branched; we ensure—

It is our duty—those who leave our fold

Can walk, confidently, gently, therein,

Charting their varied courses and planting

Their own seeds, growing, shading, sheltering.

Welcome every day for consecrating

Ourselves to the task, truths, purpose that feed

The open vision the best dreaming needs.