Daydreams Whilst Studying

four metals tokens
scratched beyond the work of polish
an eye only for blue and yellow
all the red is missing from vision
it seems dreamlike
the floorboards, like a handmade cabin
of the colonizing days
when man tried to tame the Americas,
and it cost him his life.
The boards are raw, untreated
grey and blue

my hand leans to them
one token, four in all
placed on one board,
four in all
at once the boards move
rotating like a turn of the hand
and the tokens are no more

a bear walks out on hindquarters
it moves like a son of man
snout up, snarling and sniffing
walks to my side, turns
suddenly sitting on a smaller bear
rides away slowly
jostling left to right
like a rider on a horse

a lady crouches on the boards
she has all the red
vivid and fiery like the dying flame
of a setting sun
her skirt and corset
soaked in the sun
laced with black
buttons black
black feathers adorn her hat
but her face is downturned
and I cannot gaze upon it
her hands raise,
gloved in white
one brings up an apple
a matching flame
and bites out of it
though I still cannot see,
I know it by sound

she cries out
her lips and chin visible
but for a moment
pale and cracking quickly
drying up, dying.
her clothes fall to a heap
on the blue-grey floorboards
no form to fill them
and the red sweeps over the room
as a pollen cloud over a springtime land
mixing with the color
to restore the room to fullness
And now it loses its dreamlike quality

And I snap back to,
and go back to reading.