There was a man whose dreams I could have listened to forever. A mermaid swished the 
black sheen of her scales against his legs. There was no water anywhere. She swam the 
currents just above the forest floor, singing so low it slept him. He woke in a graveyard, his 
legs under ground. Leaves swam at his throat. Exposed on his chest, in exactly the place 
where the heart would be, was his heart. Beside it, a notebook. He wrote until his hand hurt. 
He brought no words back except those I have told you. 

The next night he sought an amulet. He walked through blue smoke to a snake charmer. 
Waited for the music to twist into silence. I am come for protection, he said. Am come: that 
troubled him even there, in the dream. But the snake charmer laughed, his mouth opening 
into a soft suitcase. In place of a tongue and teeth were rubies, bright as new blood. But my 
friend could not reach for them. He was too afraid for his hand. 

I could have listened forever. But before long the dreams were too much for him, he took 
pills to absorb them. That’s when I began to lie awake thinking of heads full of dreams, on 
satin pillows, airplane pillows, sleeves. Pavement. Heads you have lain beside. How quickly 
they are lost to you. Like days you have lived but have no recollection of, none at all, though 
there was wind at your legs, blood in its circuit, maybe a sigh as you lay your head down.