The Comma in Your Dreams
A poem by Lavinia Kumar

The Comma in Your Dreams

It’s what’s left out of your dream –
pauses when words are caught
in nests, between branches,
when sentences begin with and then.

And then out rushes a paragraph,
a new poem – one line
parallel to another,
clothesline next to clothesline,
shirts separated by socks, by wide sheets,
some stolen on hot anxious days.

It’s the pause in your dream,
the mystery of a magical crevice
caught in a mountain of words,
in chapter upon chapter of blooms
among acres of lush grass.

See that head bent slightly,
those words tumbling together
as clothes in a washing machine,
sloshing uncaring in water and suds?

It sees colors, rainbows…
is that a comma escaping?

About the Author:

Lavinia Kumar received two Pushcart nominations in 2023 by Kelsey Review.  Her latest book is Spirited American Women: Early Writers, Artists, & Activists – very short prose biographies of near 90 remarkable pre-Civil War women writers, poets, publishers, painters, artists, abolitionists, early suffragettes, and activists.  She is author of 3 poetry books and 4 chapbooks.  Recent poems appear, or will appear, in a variety of journals and anthologies. Website: laviniakumar.net

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