i dreamed i was sitting in a chair
in a small dingy room
with two other men
one of whom i recognized

my dreaming self said
i know this man

i’ve never been to his house
i’ve never spent any significant time with him
but our lives do entwine

i know this man well enough to know
he and i will never be friends
far from it

i know this feeling
this knowing

the man in my dream looked at me and spoke in a way every person of his ilk has ever spoken to me

the voice of enmity
my enemy

even now the moment this kind of thought enters my mind i always feel an automatic resistance
my desire for equality and fairness compels me
filters out such words
despite the challenge
but the tenor of these times persists
a complex network of stark ideological trenches begin to appear everywhere i look

enemies
war

i despise this language and in daily life my belief in the overwhelming power of love is affirmed more often than not

but dark dissonance persists

i recently learned that the real person who appeared as the man in my dream will soon move away and thus some of my inner conflict
dissipates
for now

and so
for now
i push away such thoughts
for now

i resist the automatic generation of conflict scenarios in my mind
and return
to love

for now

——

m(__)m