After so long a journey
The traveler needed rest
So he picked one of two trees -
That was in his eye the best.

Getting off his “Clio”*
He stepped on a flower
Whose color had braved alone
The asphalt of the highway.

From his car he moved away
And faced a trench gaping gray
Which he was unable to cross
To where the water-spring was.

He yelled into the ditch
Trying to get an answer
Only his echo returned
For want of a transfer

Then a scarlet sand rose,
pulled by the small man’s toes,
Jumped right under his nose
Into the chasm with no bottom.

Back to the tree he returned
But the whole site was now ferned -
Rhizomes wherever he turned:
Underground, too, were now the
badlands.

(c) Lazhar Bouazzi, April, 2016

When I dream
I find myself in places
I never go to awake
Taking chances
I never take
For fear I will break
Or stumble.

So instead I grumble
That I never go anywhere
And let myself scare myself
Out of doing what I need
To do in order to be true
To the person I am
When I am awake.

I fully flimflam and take
The easy, the coward’s road.
I hop away like a toad
Then whine to myself
In my dreams.

It seems ineffective.
But it seems inelective.
It’s like I have no choice
But I still listen
To my sleeping voice.

Someday I may stop
And drop this bad habit,
Choosing to have it my way;
Me on the highway, walking
Instead of lying in bed talking
About how good it could be
If I were the dreaming me.