I found this poem riveting from the start, beginning with the image of "occipital light" -- i.e. the visual cortex active in the dream when our eyes 'out here' are closed.

Then to rise up in bed and at once know you're in a dream because of the physical STING OF THE AIR.  Dreams have vivid colors, sounds & even smells, but they don't often offer stings of sharp air.  Is this, too, like the presences in Fex & Coo, an example of the dream moving out into our world?

And when the dreamer asks "dutifully" what his dream seeks, I was caught by the word "dutifully".  It's as if by invoking the god of "Duty" his mind is instantly stung awake to the demands of a daytime conscience.

And I also felt the power of the image of bleeding (red) bits of himself all over the rumpled bed BECAUSE he had been dreaming of poisoned prams & crying Marjorcan bombers!

And finally the strong reminder where the poem declares: "Dreams know the end of everyone but themselves."  Indeed, dreams never do seem to end.  They last into the future with a life of their own, as Tony says, dreaming their own dreams & sleeping their own sleep -- and never get tired!

Merrilee Beckman