Sir Walter Scott conveyed me
a rule Ariosto derived:
Fictive works are wholly contrived,
so an author, he is free
to conduct his pieces
in any order he pleases.
We'll therefore now leave
Kal-El's cousin Kara,
her aged mentor, and all things Kryptonian
and move on to the matter
of Clark's wandering mother.
The motor rumbles... Pistons churn...
Her berth vibrates in reply.
Grease-laden gears, legacy
of gilded years, turn,
reluctantly at first,
but then they yearn for speed.
Sparks fly... Steam cries out,
joyful at needed escape,
as, with a hum,
the train is nudged out its station
and the disembarkation comes.
Sarah hopes it isn't too late.
She shouldn't worry --
nothing is more powerful
than a locomotive.
A soothing cadence rises
from the tracks below;
Sarah's chest, full of sighs,
falls to the wheels' loll.
Through drooping eyes
she watches misty droplets
spread into rivulets
upon the window's pane.
Her senses join the chorus
of the currents' rush,
lashes thickening in their grain
as she becomes oblivious
to the iron horse's refrain.
To dream, it would seem,
is all that remains...

...to dream...
...fun house-mirror memories
of a warrior's funeral
(mauve grass?
the cemetery gone concave?):
Rough Rider survivors pass
by an open grave
as their Colonel recalls
the sinking of the Main,
the fight against Spain,
freedoms precious to all,
and men who heeded duty's call
to save them for others.
Eben has no use for eulogies,
and little for Cuban liberty.
Bitter with loss (his big brother
Sam got shot in the head;
that's often the origin
of the honored dead),
he won't talk to his guests,
neither Marti nor Roosevelt,
though both offer condolences.
Questions he won't voice plague him,
permitting no rest: Why'd they bother
charging that hill?  Had his brother
some need to kill?  He doesn't know.
He never will, and so he wallows.
Sarah shares his pain,
but remains aware of her dream.
Things aren't what they seem,
and none of it's the same
as reality was.
The man her sister now loves
is here (Jonathan Dent had yet
to enter their lives then; he met
Martha later, when she went to school),
but he looks different, wears a cruel
grin and a cool stare.
Eben doesn't care,
but she feels the changes --
Dent's presence rearranges
the purple plot in a pall
and makes the mourners vanish.
From the sky, yellow spheres fall
into Smallville, don Klan-ish robes,
and fly off to haunt the whole globe.

The porter looks in,
but tries not to wake her.
She'll wish he had,
as, under each lid,
an eye flutters faster;
her Id's not her Maker,
but now it's her Master.

The subconscious shape-shifter
twists Dent's green face.
Mists pour out the poor man's ears
an inky black, shade of primal fears,
and his arms fade, to be replaced
by attack-tentacles, slimy
rippers that grip the golden fields.
The Octopus feeds on the hay,
emitting offensive stenches,
clouding the torn day
as if feeling its way
through deep, oceanic trenches.
Hissing and kissing
with suction-cup hands,
the monstrosity grows,
traps Kansas under its toes,
and goes on to swallow
all that she knows.
The city she'd visit,
the land, past and present,
drown in the undertow
as, in the belly of this beast,
acid waves spill over captives,
readying them for a feast.

... With a start awoken,
feeling like she's broken
an old pledge...

... Turning in the dark
to palm the damp window
and watch wheel-sparks
fly off the rail's edge...

They are coming to a halt.
The nap did no good.
That psychic squid, her wily Id,
grew a hell-bent serpent
from Jonathan Dent's head.
It slew the world and bled it white
and soon there'll be an endless night
in Metropolis.  She knows it,
but tries not to brood.

Cold sweat isn't ladylike,
thinks Sarah Kent, pulling a shawl
across her shoulders.
Neither is an upset stomach.
By an awning near the tracks
her sister waits.  She'll go back
in two weeks, not time enough
for disaster.  They embrace.
Sarah feigns a rested mood.