for Bill Sessions

Look out! my nightmare shouted,
as she crashed across the porch, flailing the shadows with a crutch.
Dark wind blew a storm of dust, or feathers, and lightning
through the rusted screen
                flared off the lenses of her glasses. You’re not Billy,
she said, jerking around twice,
                                                rolling her head like a peacock . . .

But the room had collected,
and that first filmy light through the curtains of the French doors offered only
my familiar brass and tarnished footboard, the spool-backed rocker,
the sunburst afghan
                                my dog had chewed into a rag.
No, wherever the dream had swept me, someone else was expected . . .