I Wonder When Awake

Do we always take undue pride

in the memory of a dream

with our lovers by our side

and always full of self-esteem?

Our dreams may be a nightmare

of incompetence or failure.

We see life as it might have been

with people we vaguely knew.

Is this a past which

is no longer ours?

We took a fork of a road

where a promised future glowed.

It became an overgrown path.

Do we end up crying, or laugh?

Walt Abbott–11-08-2009