Dream of Dragons

DREAM OF DRAGONS

"Some people do. They sleep completely, waking refreshed. Others live in two worlds, the lost and remembered. They sleep twice, once for the one who is gone, once for themselves. They dream thickly, dream double, they wake from a dream into another one, they walk the short streets calling out names, and then they answer."

– Naomi Shihab Nye

DREAM OF DRAGONS

MEMOIR OF A NARCOLEPTIC BY LINDA BLACK

Dream of Dragons, Memoir of a Narcoleptic is a fantasy-fiction memoir, falling into the Speculative Literature genre. While it is about my life and thus a memoir, the fantasy-fiction part is woven through my story as I convey my experience of moving through life with one foot always in dream. My waking life is dominated by a pressing dream life that is as vivid and "real" as waking reality. And let me warn you, there be dragons here! And demons and mythical beasts, fantastical creatures of all sorts. Sometimes when I move through the dream world, it so closely resembles the waking world, I can't tell which one I'm in. And the opposite occurs too: Sometimes in waking life, I need to check whether it is truly the waking world. So I'll press my fingertips to a wall, funnel all of my chi energy into my hand, and attempt to push my fingers and then my whole arm through the wall – a relatively easy task in the dream world. If I am unsuccessful, I know I'm awake. In my prologue to Dream of Dragons, I recreate one of those occurences where the dream world and waking world merge, and in this case, my daughter is under threat in both worlds.

EXCERPT FROM DREAM OF DRAGONS WORKING DRAFT

Prologue

“I’m a narcoleptic of epic proportions with dreamtime distortions of a shifting reality, based on a holographic duality where Good and Evil are twin brothers born of the same mother, and joined at the hip.”

Nothing moves in these woods. No scurrying underfoot, no sudden uplifting of wings, no hum of insects. No wind, not the slightest movement of branches, nor of the dry leaves that cling to them. It is deathly still and silent. Smothering clusters of trees block the night sky. Brittle and gnarled, with oily black roots bulging above the ground, they are held up by something other than life force. And whatever has a hold on them, it is not of this earth. I have been here before. I have never entered. This time I must.

From deep within the wicked thickness of the forest, my daughter calls, “Mama, Mama!” My blood pounds in my ears, my throat, my chest. I begin to shake, my knees buckle, but I refuse to fall. I hold myself up from the inside, funneling energy from the center of my being, the tan t’ien. I will not be daunted. I will not succumb to fear.

“Mama!” She screams again, “Mamaaaaaahhhh!"

"I'm here, I'm coming!"

The Dawn Lei Trilogy is a fictional series based on a character from my dream life. (I have outlined three books in the series, and have begun to write the first one, Remember the Sun.)

REMEMBER THE SUN

THE DAWN LEI TRILOGY, BOOK ONE BY LINDA BLACK

EXCERPT FROM WORKING DRAFT OF BOOK ONE: REMEMBER THE SUN

The first rays of the morning sun struck the bottom step to the pyramid, turning it gold, the beams then moving upward to hit each step in rhythmic succession, setting one after the other ablaze in golden light. The girl watched reverently, her eyes darting up to her mother's face only after the hundredth step lit up. It was her first time witnessing dawn at the Temple of One Hundred Suns. Her eyes glittering like black diamonds, she smiled at her mother, who nodded toward the temple indicating that the child should keep watching. She obeyed.

The sun strode more than streamed through the arches at the top of the vast stairs, like a conquering king claiming his territory, the strength of the beams seeming to fire through the temple to its inner core. The inside of the pyramid lit up in a sudden flash of brilliance just before the outer frame was enveloped, reflecting such a blinding light, the mother instinctively reached out a hand to shield her child's eyes. The child pushed her mother's hand away and laughed, a sound of absolute joy. The mother scooped the little girl up and held her close, her nose pressed into her daughter's sleek, dark braids. She smelled of hyacinth.

The mother closed her eyes for a moment, while the child continued to watch the movement of the sun's rays over the peak of the pyramid. The woman savored the heat of the morning sun as it cast its embrace around them, the warmth of her daughter's small body, and the comforting beat of the child's heart against her breast, her own heart beating with the ferocity of her love and her determination to protect her only child – even at the cost of her own life.

"To be human is to become visible while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others.

To remember the other world in this world is to live your true inheritance."

– David Whyte