I was pregnant with a child not my husband's. I wanted to leave him, but not to join my lover;
I was done defining myself through men. Nor did I want the child. I got a knitting needle, and...
CAUTION: READ THE TITLE!
A witch & I duel with blades of spiral horn. But we both just want
to create an utterly truthful oracle. Can't we find a way not to fight?
Fifty years after I drove him away with high-school idiocy, I get one last kiss before...
Anselm dreams God orders King William's death by an arrow of fire; the
King dreams his blood covers the sun. Waking, he mocks a third man's ominous
dream, goes hunting, and dies bloodily at sunset, an arrow in his heart...
She dreamt Death attacked her but her youngest kids bravely fought back--and died. 3 months later...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
Giant snakes chased me. I go lucid, turn & slay one. As I woke, the snakes cried. So I re-entered...
CAUTION: SNAKES, BEHEADING, REHEADING
Night. Home alone. A huge bear breaks in! To defend myself, I have
a chainsaw. Curiously, an electric not a gas-powered chainsaw...
The Evil Librarians drop a 19th Century book-character on my head--a blue-skinned paranoid!
He tries to kill me with a trident missing one prong... a Bident? Oh, no! He's Joe B...
CAUTION: DIM VIEW OF TWO 2020 CANDIDATES
Quiet Blondie seemed sane enough, especially compared to
her driven, talkative friend Crazy, until...
CAUTION: NUDITY, A LITTLE BLOOD
A Gypsy man invites me to dance. But he cuts my arm, deep; then even his touch multiplies
my wounds. Last is a needle through my wrist. But I'm committed to the full dance now...
CAUTION: BLOOD; CURIOUSLY, NOT PAIN
Women who run with the wolves? Ha! In Mongolia, the only ones who can beat lightning-demons are...
I search for family skeletons, but then a talking plant on TV inspires me to seek the sun and fly free.
But certain velociraptors and barbarian swordswomen object...
CAUTION: DUELS, FISH ABUSE, THE F-WORD
I'm naked in a forest where the trees talk. They want my cock. A girl materializes, and we make love, but now
the treefolk are our congregation, cheering us on. Only they call her my sister! She says "Yes. But I was never
born. Dad beat Mom to abort me." She fades away, a ghost! I pick up a knife to protect Mom against Dad...
CAUTION: PORNY SEX, SUDDEN GRIM END
I'm in a huge colonnade. An army of blood-painted men sacrifice the dove of peace. Their masked leader drinks its blood.
But then I'm carried upstairs to meet... the prophet Daniel! I'm amid the angels, on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel...
CAUTION: BLOOD-DRINKING THUGS
DAY: I thorn-puncture my hands while gardening, and write stupid poetry about it...
EVE: I watch Little Darlings, a teen sex farce that turns weirdly serious...
DREAM: a Mysterious Pussy guards us librarians from stinky alien dinosaurs...
CAUTION: SEXUAL INNUENDO???
A guy threatens me with a knife. I sit on him and wait patiently.
Slowly he turns into a huge black cat! I set him free in a garden...
I meet a tragic heroine--great heart, rotten luck. But I open her magic sword and find a bad chip...
In vain I struggle with my father, with his strong arms and wary eyes... I give up... agonizing quests down darkened
streets... long shadows on columns and porticos... a crowd gathers; my father may be in danger... I want to flee...
An over-eager landscaper mows my dad's new beard, unasked. Debate in court!
Is the art of mowing free speech, or is your face your castle?
I stab and stab my pillow. The room rains yellow feathers. The teeth in my head are blue,
growing out of my scalp. A dentist appears, holding a yellow drill. I scream, "No!
It's time to shop for lemons." In the Supermarket my teeth grow wild as tusk...
I visit a witch-smeller, who judges apprentice shamans.
But when a boy dreams he's a crocodile, she freaks out...
Holding a luminous crystal sword, I enter a crypt where a king lies--ill, not dead.
An old woman wants to punish him, but as he stirs, I sheathe my sword...
I saw one man stalk another. Unprovoked, he cut his throat. I felt I knew him but couldn't see his face...
That night, my brother-in-law was brutally murdered in just this fashion, outside a wedding party...
CAUTION: GRIM. 19TH-CENTURY GRIM.
I meet a nice werewolf in a hall of past-life junk, so sharp and rusty we dare not play...
Croesus dreamt his heir Atys was slain by an iron blade; he locked them all in the armory. But Atys went
hunting; his guard Adrastus's spear went astray. Did Fate kill Atys, or superstition rattling poor Adrastus?
As a man on shore patrol in Manila is attacked, he and his mother simultaneously see and hear each other...
by Gala Dalí 1943? painted by Salvador Dalí 1944; a supposedly instantaneous dream.
Dalí's wife Gala naps, but a bee wakes her--and her dream instantly magnifies
bee into tigers! After all, both have fur, sharp bits, black & gold stripes...
CAUTION: BREASTS; BAD DREAM THEORIES.
Dream poems laid out like a calendar. Themes? Horses, camels, abused girls, vampires--all want their freedom...
Fighting vampire archers is risky enough WITH proper armor! And all I have is dream-journals...
CAUTION: MENTIONS BATTERING
I try to pick a flower in Golden Gate Park. But it fights back--plucks an ear, an eye, my nose.
A half-gardener, half-cop hands me shears. But I turn from the flower at the last minute to cut...
CAUTION: SURREAL VIOLENCE
I'm at a garden-party when They attack. I flee through a garden of swords, but a guard with a bayonet...
I'm a child in a Latin American city who's murdered on the street. Then I'm my brother,
seeking my own murderers. I find the General behind it! Unfortunately...
CAUTION: DYING. DYING TWICE. AND THEN NEARLY AGAIN, AWAKE...
At a beach, a man attacks the genitals, buttocks and thighs of a giant who sits half in the surf, ignoring him...
CAUTION: NUDITY, MUTILATION ATTEMPTS
I'm a priestess standing on a stone terrace, holding a ritual axe. Before me kneels a sacrifice to the Goddess...
They led me to the guillotine. As the blade struck my neck,
I woke to find my headboard had broken loose and fallen on my...
Helicopter gunships invade. I repel bullets with pure willpower. But
they too have shields making guns useless. I duel two soldiers...
CAUTION: SURREAL VIOLENCE
On a hunt, Guntram took a nap. His courtier saw a snake emerge from his mouth; it tried to cross a creek. The
courtier lay his sword out like a bridge, and the snake crossed, climbed a hill, and went in a hole. It returned
and crawled in Guntram's mouth. He woke and said "I was crossing a river on a great iron bridge..."
DREAM: I'm in the Arctic facing a hostile mob. I insist "I'm dreaming; you can't hurt me." They try!
I look down at my body, stuck full of hatchets, and say "See?" They slink off, looking sheepish...
TWO DAYS LATER: I'm in northern England. A reporter snaps "Dreams won't help the miners..."
A revival meeting goes bad--suicides, 'long pig', a hell-pit. If you sup with the devil, carry a long fork!
Forced into a duel, I let my spirit fight for me using Boomerang Blades. But my
enemy becomes giant floating sticky lips! My spirit finds incarnation confusing...
I'm a hobbit seeking Henry Fonda's haunted gold mine. And find it. Or is that chocolate?
But then I'm caught in a shamanic showdown in a bar where they serve real spirits...
I tour the heart of a red supergiant, where dreaming souls explore
their fears and heart's desires, unconstrained by solid matter...
CAUTION: SWEDENBORGIAN VISION, UNICORN NUDITY
A car crashes & burns--but the driver bailed! No one to save...
A miner stabs a baby "because everyone not underground is evil"...
Radar O'Reilly from MASH, President Calvin Coolidge and I confuse who's who...
Jung's visions of dragons evolve from fiery destroyers
to thieves who can be forced to give up treasure
to peacful, luminous guardians of the sacred...
The dead treasure-hunter's will ordered us, his heirs, to convene in the wood.
Attacked there by a knight in armor, we near-strangers must unite to win our...
A courtroom hostage-drama where I'm forced to commit... tracheotomy! And then the Gulf War begins...
CAUTION: CARTOON VIOLENCE
Sunset. Walking home from work. A smiling, creepy American offers a ride. I back away until I'm against a tree.
I don't give away the Arab hiding in its branches. I have a knife, and I know I will kill this American...
CAUTION: FIGHT TO THE DEATH BREWING
I'm watching MTV. Laurie Anderson gets inside my remote control. I try to change channels
and she turns my head into an apple. I grope for a potato peeler, and carve a new mouth...
I see a leopard chasing an Indian man who defends himself with a knife; then
I wake. To find I'm still witnessing the same scene, only now I'm the leopard...
"Freedom is a gift you give yourself." But it doesn't always involve seahorses or babycarriages covered in quills...
Creatures in the primal sea touch my third eye, dragons cry their eyes out, I fight the Sphinx, and arrive at last in...
War between a big conformist land and a small land devoted to quality. Big Land's rulers all die, but at last, sheer
numbers defeat the smaller land. Now their leader, beaten and starved, awaits the sword at the end of the hall...
CAUTION: POLITICAL? ACCORDING TO CARL JUNG!
I don't want to kill my friend, though his clothes say I must. But
a sculptor lets us sit on her metal trees and drink tea instead...
by Jenny Badger Sultan; Jan-Feb 2003, painting of a dream-series
My dreams were troubled by war. So I painted them in concentric rings--lotus, fire, children, animals, and nightmares...
Agents of Donald Trump with knives trap a mermaid. I jump one of them, and she
escapes, towing me with her. She assumed humans just hate merfolk, but I know...
CAUTION: HARSH WARNING ABOUT TRUMP
I'm in what seems to be a village of very conservative Muslims. But they're really alien castaways...
You say you're leaving me. I go to grab an ice pick to stab you, but my hand
freezes to the ice block on the stair--I dare not even dream of murder. Since...
CAUTION: RESPONSE TO SPOUSAL SUICIDE
The foul old fossil woman had carved and burnt her own flesh in the name of art;
we washed her till she was reborn young. It was my turn next to enter the water...
Nearly everyone in my family dreams of a mass murder as it happens nearby. But my dad's sure it's his own
evil id, and my mom clams up, and my sister forgets. And me? I doubt the whole thing for ten years, until...
CAUTION: NIGHTMARE VIOLENCE
After eating iffy food, I had gut pains all night--but I dreamed of rebels with swords
fighting a fascist empire. Were my dreams siding with the food? Well, no...
We stood meekly in line to be beheaded. I tried to accept my fate and commended myself to God... CAUTION: READ THE TITLE!
I challenge my teacher's claim human historical patterns are universal.
She challenges me by dragging us both back to the Ice Age and...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
Erica dreams that during a protest she's caught in a radioactive flood...
Michael dreams a nuclear forcefield makes his fingertips explode and congeal into weird knobs...
Joanne dreams she meets nuclear mutants with curling black nails great for peeling potatoes...
Scott dreams the world goes silent and white, bleaching out. His hands dissolve...
On the street called Old And In The Way, I meet a psychic I crushed on as a kid,
and then, in a hearth, fight the tentacled alien who's been stalking me...
I meet my true love during a coup. We go through Hell together, like Orpheus and Eurydice--only we...
Martial-arts student Parvati just won't fight the teacher she loves (too much!)--
not even for her final exam. Instead she gets a rotary saw and...
I'm to be martyred. I ask if the man I love can strangle me. Yes! I say farewell to our hermaphroditic genius baby...
I had a dream I was exploring ruins in a forest, where
I encountered this feral girl with a porcupine head....
The time-caves under Golden Gate Park lead to supervillains, magical girls, miniphants,
bamboo thugs, adorable dinosaurs, and... pandemics. But is there a way back home?
I'm a Confederate officer. The only way to save my men is to end the war by
pulling the plug at the bottom of the lake! I dive in, fighting a Yankee, who...
I was just a street rat, but I danced with the princess at a ball, and fell in love. Three rich suitors pulled their blades...
I didn't know myself what this was about, till I had to write this note--and suddenly I got it...
I fled a demon into a shadowy construction zone where an even worse telepathic lion-devil
lured me in with soothing flattery. I woke shaking--and then things in my room began to move...
CAUTION: DEMONS, POLTERGEIST PHENOMENA
A sorceror's apprentice describes a medical procedure her teacher plans.
Yow! I sure wouldn't trust anyone to try that on ME...
CAUTION: TALK OF BLOOD AND SEX
Soon after I was given the name Spotted Fawn, I dreamed I was one,
fleeing faceless hunters under the full moon. There's history in this...
A street poet preaches a gospel of smallness, until he pokes at capitalism in a slightly too personal way...
I defeat the knife-wielder, in spite the blade in my belly I can't pull out. I may have to let it be...
To avoid being stabbed, I flee the Psychodrama Circus. Wisely--the place explodes!
But it's the filling of the sushi roll that really upsets me...
CAUTION: CANNIBAL MAKI
A boar attacks Swedenborg's late brother, alive again. He tries to help, but the pig
eats his brother's head. That's what you get for drinking, partying, and gluttony...
CAUTION: VIOLENT DEATH
I visit my friend Xanthe's lungs, where I meet a swordswoman in a red bikini. I get a unicorn pendant,
go lucid, and become a heron too, but next day, it's the red-bikini-swordswoman I actually meet...
I slept late and felt a bit stiff, but until my friends pulled it out of my neck I had no idea...
Swedenborg gets in a duel, but his beautiful silver hilt has no sword attached. Uh-oh...
Then he's in bed and realizes he's been sexually boasting...
CAUTION: PHALLIC SYMBOLISM
Dusk. A plain. A troop of swordsmen approach me, draw their weapons...
and toss their spinning, shining swords up to the stars...
My friend Tanya tries hard to save her marriage, but in her dreams Isidora Duncan,
Carl Jung, even the gods themselves warn her to face their deep incompatibility...
The card confirming those silly fears are true. The nightmare is real. You're in trouble...
Having (or living with) a sharp mind is like living with a unicorn. That horn can kill or heal...
I get speared by Irish warriors, slipped an LSD dose, chased by giant spiders, torpedoed--hey, I'm not bored!
My cold-sensitive dinosaur friend makes a find at our archeological dig by thinking like the Old Ones...
I was a mermaid trying to find Count Coyote's stolen dreams, so I could marry my human girlfriend...
CAUTION: NUDITY, SEX, LESBIAN MARRIAGE, ANTI-FUNDAMENTALISM
As a kid, my nightmares were of Sesame Street characters. In my teens I graduated to
slasher nightmares and recurring lucid dreams. Alcohol trashed my dreams for years, but
now they're not nightmares--just surreal. Hitler wrecks my sex life! What a spoilsport...
CAUTION: (MOSTLY FRUSTRATED) SEX
In 1985 I was flooded with nightmares about heads and necks. They had an unparalleled intensity...
At the beach, a biology teacher shows me how bottles smashed on the rocks by jerks lead to
slow death for the tidepool creatures. I'm afraid the warning is both personal AND planetary...
CAUTION: CAUSTIC TOWARD RECKLESS G.O.P. CUTS
I'm a rabbit girl living in New Orleans. Humid summer. My roses all died;
a rot that needs to be disinfected. So I light a torch and burn them back...
CAUTION: HARSH POLITICAL INTERPRETATION
After a class where students are forced to vivisect anesthetized dogs
I dreamed I'd made a mistake; I was sawing open my daughter...
CAUTION: CREEPY DREAM, CREEPY DISMISSAL
I make a weird vow--while I absent-mindedly slice up other people's cars! The next day...
CAUTION: DREAM VANDALISM
by Jenny Badger Sultan; 2000/3/23 & 2000/4/19, twin dreams of carved women
A woman is knifed by the sea. I cradle her, but she's probably dying...
For my intitiation-ordeal, I have to cut designs in my own back! I can't reach, so...
Swedenborg fights a monster but lacks strength. Yet later, on a higher plane, he learns the beast did die...
CAUTION: VIOLENT
We found an injured girl with wings. We took her to the hospital and
I warned them she might be dangerous, but no one listened to me...
I slay the beautiful dragon attacking us, despite my regret.
And then, as I sleep, glowing eyes advance on our keep AGAIN...
Mr Bai dreams his son the mandarin is a tiger leading a pack of wolves--all man-eaters,
at least until two angels knock out his fangs and predict he'll get beheaded soon...
CAUTION: CANNIBALS, REVENGE KILLINGS
Night street. Two masked assassins attack a woman. I intervene. But I need a weapon!
I picture the Turkish sword on my mantel. The yataghan appears in my hand and I...