Fall/Winter 2014
Artwork, “I Remain” by Niall Parkinson
RUNNING DREAM
I dreamed I got lost in time—
That I strayed too far behind
And the clock’s crooked lines
Diverged. I tried to scream but
My voice failed. It seems that’s what
It’s for now. My hand took cuts
As loose seconds slapped my face.
I felt gone, rubbed out, erased
By clicks. I picked up my pace
When I thought I saw your back,
Forgetting any attacks
That minutes had planned. The track
Coiled through my sleeping mind,
Kept roiling until the time
I felt your breath just behind.
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Mark J. Mitchell studied writing at UC Santa Cruz under Raymond Carver, George Hitchcock and Barbara Hull. His work has appeared in various periodicals over the last thirty five years, as well as the anthologies Good Poems, American Places,Hunger Enough, and Line Drives. His chapbook, Three Visitors has recently been published by Negative Capability Press. Artifacts and Relics, another chapbook, is forthcoming from Folded Word and his novel, Knight Prisoner, will be published in the coming months. He lives in San Francisco with his wife, the documentarian and filmmaker Joan Juster.