In this damn recurring dream
I have a fish tank an elaborate fish tank
(I don’t really, in real life have any fish tanks,
when I was a child I did, with guppies and
goldfish, black mollies and catfish,
but that was another time, another era)
a big tank, 50, 80 gallons, maybe bigger,
with plants and colored rocks,
ceramic bubblers and some large beautiful fish,
serene fish, floating along in the water,
angelfish and zebras, neon tetras
and sucker-mouths stuck to the sides.
But in this dream I keep forgetting to feed them,
I don’t remember feeding them for weeks,
yet miraculously they are all still alive,
but droopy and hungry, and I can’t
find the food and I keep getting distracted
and I should go out and buy some food,
I should feed them, I must feed them,
I’m trying to feed them, I am their god after all,
if I don’t feed them they will perish.
But I never get to it, and always fail,
wake up with these poor fish unfed and hungry.
About Michael Estabrook
