Notes from the Creative Literary Editor

Dreams as Poetry—Lost and Found

You see things, and you say, “Why?” But I dream things that never were and I say, “Why not?”

—George Bernard Shaw

Dreams and poetry are the crown jewels of our imagination, springing from the pure unconscious and offering our originality, aliveness, and unknowable self. And whether a dream is a poem or a poem is a dream really depends on where you choose to enter the circle. A writer once told me the dream is the most perfect story because it is all unconscious. It captures unworded feelings, the unthinkable, uninhibited newness, and vivid images. In all its beauty and ugliness, it surprises us. Dreams offer us transcendence. Vincent Van Gogh said, “I dream my painting and then paint my dreams.”

In this issue, five poets pull their dreams from a place of timelessness, deep down in the creative unconscious—then translate wordless chaotic feelings and images into poetic language.

You, the reader, are invited into the most private places of someone else’s unimagined soul.