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Courage and Cowardice

Courage and bravery in dreams and out. Or, as in Fellini's I'm Not the Director! cowardice and ducking responsibility.

RELATED TOPICS: fear - assertion - nightmares - dreams of self-defense - opportunity grasped - opportunity blown - perseverance - initiations and ordeals - bullies and threats - endless climbs - hunted! - topdogs: cops, authoritarians, and rule-enforcers - warnings and advice - shyness - See also the full INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

What this site is - Add your dreams! - How to read blurbs - Ratings - Copyright - Downloading - The World Dream Bank has 4000 dreams plus 1000 pages on dreamwork, shamanism, surrealism, fantasy, worldbuilding, creativity and genius. Site © Chris Wayan 2001-2022.


THE AIR BURUNDI PAINTINGS: by Wayan; 7 illus., 2007/1/20, a dream of art & courage
Weird paintings cover a hill town in Africa, demanding I paint them when I wake.
Paintings on courage, flight... and defying tradition.
THE AMAZONS' OFFER: by Wayan; 2012/6/13, a mystical sexy dream poem.
A horde of wild women camp in my yard and practice leaping
through invisible spacetime portals. They invite me along...
CAUTION: FEATHERED, PAINTED NUDITY
AND THEN I WOKE UP: by Wayan; 1980/11/4, an illustrated dreamtale.
A dream of mushrooms, flying, canyons, giant Rocs out of Sindbad--and a moral challenge.
ANNIE, GET YOUR GOWN!: by Wayan; 1988/9/14, a comic dream.
I'm Annie Oakley, sharpshooter, facing something scarier than gunmen: a formal ball
introducing me to my new husband's family--Austrian aristocracy! What's an American gal to do?
THE ANT REPRESENTATIVE: by Wayan; 1996/3/18, a romantic dream of bugs.
I fall in love with a diplomat from a hive mind. Am I luring her into dangerous individuality?
THE ARMS POLICY: by Wayan; 2000/4/7, a nightmare.
The government has a harsh policy on armed dissidents. Not the kind of arms you think...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
AT LEAST HE'S A DOCTOR: by Wayan; 1982/4/7, a sharp warning dream.
I'm a Puertorriqueña who falls for an Anglo doctor, but he's not what he seems...
CAUTION: UNDERAGE SEX, CREEPY GUY, VICIOUS FIGHT
AUSPICIOUS TRACTOR HATE: by Wayan; 1984/4/17, a triumphant frustration dream!
A party for me and my shadow, to celebrate that we haven't killed each other, just HATE each other...
AUTISTIC EDGE: by Wayan, 2023/5/16, a weird little dream-sermon
An autistic genius gets distracted from her cosmological research, and rants
about non-autistics' monkey-mind distractions, distorting their worldview...
CAUTION: HARSH ON NEUROTYPICALS
THE AXE OF DEATH: by Catherine McDiarmid Paton; c. 1830, a grisly predictive nightmare.
She dreamt Death attacked her but her youngest kids bravely fought back--and died. 3 months later...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
BALANCE?: by Wayan, 1984/10/10, a dream about dreams.
Silky, my sentient starship, gives me a scolding about playing it safe...
BALLOON DIVE: by Wayan; 2007/6/17, a nightmare saying I made the least bad choice
A boy leaps from a runaway balloon, falls 100' into a pond, and floats face-down.
I'm sure he's dead, but when a woman fishes him out...
BALOLOKONG: by Wayan, 1984/11/13; a Hopi time-travel dream.
The Ice Hotel, where all my selves are sealed. Can we thaw Einstein? Balolokong the Rainsnake says...
BAND-AIDS: by Bagheera Pardus; c.1985, a lucid re-entered nightmare turned to joy.
Giant snakes chased me. I go lucid, turn & slay one. As I woke, the snakes cried. So I re-entered...
CAUTION: SNAKES, BEHEADING, REHEADING
A BEAGLE, THREE WOLVES, AND A SETTER: by Wayan; 2009/2/6, a dream-poem; Dreamverse #50
Fresh off the Beagle, Darwin meets three wolf-girls, but has distinctly Biblical inhibitions...
CAUTION: EXHIBITIONISM, SPECISM, PUNS
A BEAM OF FLIGHT: by Wayan; 1992/4/19, a dream of love and shellshock.
I'm a dance teacher, I'm King Kong, I'm a shell-shocked elf, I'm a wild bird flying...
CAUTION: GAY-POSITIVE ROLE MODELS, OH NO!
BEAR READ DUNE: by Wayan; dreamed 1981/1/28, painted 10 years later.
There are many astral planes--this world's just the cellar.
A cat and a bird in love, a literate bear and I guard the astral stair...
BIKE FROM A BOMB: by Wayan; 1981/3/14, a bikemare.
Idiotically, I bet I can escape an atomic bomb on my bike. Maybe if I ignore stoplights...
CAUTION: IRRESPONSIBLE WEAPONS USE
THE BIKE KNIGHTS: by Wayan; 1992/7/6, a cautionary Jungian dreamtale.
Two unarmed sisters on bikes easily defeated a dragon, but in a
rematch he killed them, and all other challengers. What changed?
BLACK MAGIC: by Wayan; 1986/11/10, a dream of love and rage;
Chapter 8 of UNICORN TAG, though it can stand alone.
A packet of magic soupmix sends me upstairs to a secret wizards' lab.
They've summoned a demon they can't handle: the furious Black Unicorn...
BLOOD DANCE: by Larry Vigon; Sept. 1997; an initiatory commitment dream
A Gypsy man invites me to dance. But he cuts my arm, deep; then even his touch multiplies
my wounds. Last is a needle through my wrist. But I'm committed to the full dance now...
CAUTION: BLOOD; CURIOUSLY, NOT PAIN
BLUE LIPS, GOLD EYES, ORANGE JUICE: by Wayan; 1997/5/8, a warning dream.
In a world where respectable men wear masks, an old, old man rebels in the crudest way he can...
BLUE SOUP, NO SPARK: by Wayan; 1985/6/1, an epic dream on outgrowing God
A visit to a world where they fear blue soup ends in death and resurrection, so I'm pissed at my boss--God.
CAUTION: DEATH, REBIRTH, SACRILEGE... JOB BURNOUT
A BODICE RIPPER: by Carla Young, 2010/2/22; epic (and episodic) dream with 5 paintings
Awkward newlyweds. Not a love match! Can they co-operate to save a woman from the Nazis?...
BONK VERONICA: by Wayan; 1997/4/1, 9-page dream-comic on body image
The world's first all-bulemic band, Veronica and the Vomits, provokes a riot at our local punk club. So I go to
Anorexic Bootcamp where models learn self-defense under fire, as calories and fat jokes whiz by...
CAUTION: BARF, HORNY ANOREXIC, FOOD FIGHT
BONOBO AND BEAR: by Wayan, 1999/10/14, a mystic war-dream.
The gods of our cave-past and star-future fight over us--using us, of course. After I see the toll it's taking on a
bonobo buddy of mine, I decide to bring the war back home, and go gunning for God--BOTH of them...
CAUTION: APES AND EXPLOSIVES DON'T MIX
THE BOSS'S GUTS: by Wayan; 1993/6/3, a dream on health-sabotage..
Flu. Ow, cramps! But that night I dream of a miner's rebellion against our fat-cat boss. Which side am I on?
BOYS WHO RUN WITH THE SCISSORS: by Wayan; 1986/1/26, a shamanic dream-joke
Women who run with the wolves? Ha! In Mongolia, the only ones who can beat lightning-demons are...
BRANCHING WOMAN: by Patricia Garfield 1973/3/9, painted by Brenda Ferrimani; a recurrent dream
I was at a dream conference and brought up a recurrent theme
that others hadn't mentioned: multiple antlerlike branchings...
BREAK FREE: by Emily Joy; 2006/5/11, an encouraging dream on the price of safety.
I search for family skeletons, but then a talking plant on TV inspires me to seek the sun and fly free.
But certain velociraptors and barbarian swordswomen object...
CAUTION: DUELS, FISH ABUSE, THE F-WORD
BROWN DRESS: by Wayan; 1984/2/11, 9-page digital comic of a sexy healing dream.
A champion swimmer tells me how she turned a sexual humiliation into excitement and liberating power...
CAUTION: NUDITY, SEX, SHAME, PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPLEXITY
BUT SUCH DIFFERENT FRAUDS!: by Wayan; 1996/11/4, a moral dream.
A woman who posed as a Starfleet officer discovers other frauds on board. She blows the whistle on them...
THE CAMBODIAN GIRL: by Wayan; 1996/4/2 dream, sculpted 1998/11/9.
VERY mixed media--the boat is warped wood. And the story is warped more...
CAUTION: SEX, SHAME FROM EARLY TRAUMA
CAMERA STRIKE: by Wayan, 1996/10/19, a dream within a dream with a point.
I dream I'm a lemur-girl in an emotional maze.
I wake to find I'm really a satyr cartoonist.
Funny, we have a lot in common! I wake to find...
CAUTION: PHALLIC SATYRE
CHANGE THE CORE PROGRAM: by Wayan; 1995/6/28, a dream of sudden progress.
I meet a tragic heroine--great heart, rotten luck. But I open her magic sword and find a bad chip...
CHARACTER ISOLATED BY A DEED: by Wayan; 1992/3/13, a dream's eye view of waking minds.
People SAY they like realistic characters they can identify with, but they don't ACT like it...
CIRCUS GIRL: by Wayan; 1993/1/10, a dream of love and trouble.
I fall for a circus girl. Her brother is jealous, so all the dwarves show up with guns...
CAUTION: INCEST ISSUES
CLAY BEHEADER: by Wayan; 1983/7/28, a nightmare offer.
A woman's stalked by a clay monster that eats heads. But it has a proposition for both of us...
CAUTION: CANNIBAL MONSTER
CLIMB FROM THE PIT: by Wayan, 1996/11/9, a dream parable.
I'm in the Mideast. No wonder it's a war zone--it's a vast pit BUILT for war!
But a spiral stair leads slowly out, to...
CLOTHES MAKE THE HERO: by Wayan; 1995/4/9, a dream on the power of tackiness.
I always laughed at those silly superhero outfits. But when it's my turn to fly, I find out why...
CAUTION: LANGUAGE
COEURL: by Wayan; 1980/2/26, a dream of surprise transcendence
I'm trapped in an alien hotel, my true love has gone radioactive,
and the only way out is to turn into a giant, scary...
CAUTION: CLOSET LESBIAN. LITERAL CLOSET.
COLLAPSE THEM IN THE ZONE: by Wayan; 1995/4/7, a dream of ghosts and physics.
I explore a zone lost in Shroedinger probabilities, and meet time-ghosts who want to collapse into reality...
A COLONY IN THE HOLLOW HILLS: by Wayan; 1997/8/14, a dream of responsibility.
Hong Kong's not devolving to China, but to Faerie. As governor, I have to defend human rights, so...
CORPSE-BUG: by Wayan; 1994/12/1, an allegorical sex nightmare.
I'm a hippie girl in San Francisco, in hard times. To escape the Four Horsemen, I lie down with Death...
CAUTION: GANGS, CREEPY SEX
COSMOLOGIST: by Wayan; 1994/12/2, another physicist's nightmare.
A mad gunman breaks in and shoots at me, but I start him talking, and learn what's eating him...
CREEPINESS: by Scottopic; 2001/11/30. A hypnogogic nightmare.
I'm in bed sleepily petting my cat, when I see my cat across the room! What's on my legs? It's big.
My cat chases it off... through the wall? My room is sealed. Where did it come from, where did it go?...
CROC BOY: by Wayan; 2008/8/17, a dream-poem, Dreamverse #7.
I visit a witch-smeller, who judges apprentice shamans.
But when a boy dreams he's a crocodile, she freaks out...
CROWBOTTLE: by Wayan; 1998/1/2, a dream of a wise foolish act.
It was on a beach. Inside, a black thing squirmed and boiled.
Despite all the tales of vengeful djinn, I pull the cork...
THE CROWS OF OZ: by Wayan; 1984/8/23, a moral dream on darkness.
I learn from the crows of Oz why loneliness and even tragedy are vital for a living universe...
CRUMB: by Wayan; 1995/6/7; film review/essay on art-integrity
Cartoonist Robert Crumb just turns off all taboos while drawing. A learnable technique...
CAUTION: LANGUAGE, CARTOON SEX
"CRY, BABY!": by Wayan, 1985/8/17, dream-farce with a warning.
The only man in the Miss America Japanese Tea Ceremony Swimsuit Pageant, I learn a tearful lesson...
CAUTION: DYSFUNCTIONAL FLIRTING
CRYPTOMNESIC TROLLEY: by Wayan; 1991/4/22, a lucid dream of a suicidal experiment.
To prove I really am lucid-dreaming, I let a streetcar run me over. Mm, crunchy! Then I find out...
CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS AT OM...
CYCLOPS, or, THE ANSWER TO MY PRAYER: by Wayan; 1993/8/24, a spiritual nightmare.
In the far future, I relive Odysseus' tale. To save my life I must give up realistic hope, and focus on...
CAUTION: CANNIBAL MONSTERS
THE DARII: by Wayan; 1994/8/15, a predictive dream of another life.
I'm trying to prevent a race war, but can I kill someone I admire? And if so, can I live with it?
CAUTION: RACISM, VIOLENCE, INTENSE GUILT
THE DEER PARTY: by Wayan; 1986/4/10. A magical dream
Chapter 1 of a nine-story series: UNICORN TAG.
A sentient factory shows me a gene-tweaked future where the Deer Party agitates for
liberty, equality and fertility. In that future I learn I too may not be human...
DEER SORCERESS: by Wayan; 1981/5/18, a dream on the virtues of chaos.
A witch-girl turned to a deer flees hell-hounds who just CAN'T get organized...
DESERT EYES: by Wayan; 1984/3/4, a dream of portals.
We desert-hobbits break through to a world of jungle giants who
see differently from us. Will they believe us about the UFOs?
DIURNAL AND NOCTURNAL WORLDS: by Wayan; 1993/11/8, an epic dream of the multiverse.
Round the ring of twelve worlds and their twelve gods, seeking one god who's giving me grief...
DOCTOR VENTRIL: by Wayan; 1978/9/22, a nightmare where I'm the nightmare.
A doctor lures me into his office. What he turns out to be scares me less than how I defend myself...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE, ARACHNOPHOBIA
DO YOU LOVE ME, JOHN?: by Wayan; 1991/7/6, a dream on the courage of the shy.
I dream of a future where blondes are a too-cute endangered species. How can they survive? Like this...
CAUTION: NUDITY
THE DOOR THROUGH DEATH: by Wayan; 1981/10/25; a Greco-Egyptian nightmare poem
At death's door, my friend lets Cerberus devour her, so I can enter
Death's pyramid alive and expose the truth about the afterlife...
CAUTION: FATAL DOG ATTACK
DRAGON BANNERS: by Wayan; 1987/3/19, a dream on the value of inner emptiness.
A dragon's daughter seeking her inheritance defies a sneaky dragon-realtor out to own the world...
THE DREAM POLICE: by Wayan; 1994/4/6, a dream on persecution.
The police confiscate my therapist's copies of my dreams, and try me for obscenity! So why do I help?...
DREAMS BLOCK VAMPIRE ARROWS: by Wayan; 1995/3/30, an encouraging nightmare.
Fighting vampire archers is risky enough WITH proper armor! And all I have is dream-journals...
CAUTION: MENTIONS BATTERING
EIGHT TO A HORN: by Wayan; 1986/4/25, a magical dream, Chapter 7 of UNICORN TAG.
In the middle of Nowhere Desert, I meet a telepathic unicorn who's stuck with a false safety-tag...
ELBERETH PAUSES: by Wayan; 1989/6/26, a dream on postwar ethics.
After the Lord of the Rings falls, Elbereth herself is sent to heal the land. But she has a troubling neighbor...
THE ELEVEN CENT ORACLE: by Wayan; 1998/11/12, a dream on accumulating... change.
I'm a migratory girl who's lost my tribe. I find eleven coins, cross the world, and pay the Oracle...
ERÉNDIRA: by Wayan; dreamed 1984/10/3, a grotesque predictive dream
1: Mimes stage an Orgy For Peace. Shy, I wait my turn. Should've run off with that girl eyeing me!
2: My friend Diane says "Men are selfish!" I pop her safety valve; she vents a great cloud of rage...
Two days later: I go see the film Eréndira; it's full of scenes & lines from my dream...
CAUTION: CHARITY PROSTITUTION BY MIMES
THE ETHICS OF LUCIDITY: by Wayan; 1994/2/19, a thoughtful dream on time and cause.
I'm at a symposium on how our beliefs alter not just the future, but the PAST...
CAUTION: CONTAINS IDEAS
THE EYE by Nancy Price; 1948, a nightmare of resisting torture
A staring Eye tries to break me; his cats & robots flay me. Yet his birds rebel in sympathy, & I refuse to die...
FAIRY WIFE: by Wayan; 1985/1/17, an epic dream of love and choice.
A fairy woman and a mortal man? Can't work! They're flighty, we're crude. Doomed, right?
Well, some people are so sure of it they decide to help things along a bit. Or a lot...
FALSE BOTTOM: by Edith Wharton; October 1913, a summing-up nightmare.
Demons open a trunk full of the horrors I've faced this year, and lay them out, mocking me... but is that all?
FIRST DATE: by Wayan; 1991/10/20, a true story.
I have weird, bad luck around dating. Finally I go on a picnic with Page, and the Great Fire begins...
FISHERGIRLS: by Wayan; 2.6M, 42 illus.; 1996/7/15; a sexy dream epic.
I had an epic dream lasting subjective weeks--a true other life. It wasn't Earth and we weren't human.
I was a teenage lemur, sailing with two friends into unknown waters--a rite of passage. One night,
my friends curled round me, I saw I didn't WANT to pass the test, be declared a woman, marry, and have pups.
I loved my girl friends. In a world lacking the very word, I was groping toward queerdom.
Sailing into unknown waters! "Here be dragons," the old maps say. And they were right...
2600K loads slowly? Try it in parts: 1: HOME, 650K, 2: VOYAGE, 1200K, 3: BACK 750K.
CAUTION: NUDITY, SEX, QUEER TEEN ANGST, ANTI-FUNDAMENTALISM
FLOO PORTAL: by Wayan; 2015/12/4, a dreamlet-poem on stepping over lines
I live in a huge half-hotel. The only way into the other half is through a fireplace.
It's forbidden. But one woman steps through the fire--do I dare follow?...
FLY, DANCER!: by Wayan; 1993/4/2; an advisory dream.
In my ballet class, we were learning to leap. But I wanted to FLY. So I went outside alone...
THE FOREST BRIDE: by Jenny Badger Sultan; 1994/7/23 & 1994/12/10; opposing solstice dreams
In the midsummer dream, I'm at a wedding in the Russian forest;
in winter, I dream I hold an emaciated girl as she breathes her last...
FOUR OF TEN: by Wayan; 2021/4/3, four examples from ten dreams in one night
Books are clothes, and always were. A potato makes me lie, and everyone gets it but me.
Sex in a crowd disarms the Mom Squad! And a Mystic Autistic's soul explores my room...
CAUTION: PUBLIC SEX? PROBABLY.
FREDDY KRUEGER'S POLITICS: by Wayan; 1992/8/20, a dream of... ambition?
Freddy has plans for me and Telly Savalas's daughter. But to lure us in, he must know what
we want. But what does Freddy want? If we can find out, we might just lure him, too...
FREEZE!: by Wayan; 1984/5/29, a surreal dream of asymptotic political advice
Demons of fire invade the house, and the Voice of Truth says they can't be killed. What would you do?
GANDHI RUNS: by Wayan; 1997/8/1, a fusion dream.
Gandhi and I must run barefoot across a burning racetrack miles wide... the Ascetic Desert?
GARGOYLE GO-BETWEEN: by Wayan; 1996/11/22, a Hogwartish dream.
I'm odd kid out in my wizard school till gargoyles raid us, and I puzzle out their tongue, to become...
GET YOUR BODY BACK: by Wayan; 1997/6/11, a dreamed parable.
A man dies--his body's chopped up. He ends in Hell. But he's a stubborn guy; he wants his body back. So...
THE GHOSTMASTER: by Wayan; 1992/6/16, a dreamtale of the Shadow.
I win a starship from the hostile Ghostmaster; in space I gain the confidence to confront him, and find...
GLASS EATER: by Wayan; 1982/12/10, a dream on managing ESP.
I live in an asylum for fragile psychics. When one man over-uses his talent, he compulsively eats glass...
CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME
GOAT DARE: by Wayan; 1984/8/22, a sex nightmare.
A girl and I climb a half-built tower to get some privacy from my nosy, sneering parents.
But they find us during oral sex, and their scorn melts my girlfriend into a goat...
CAUTION: SEX, HUMILIATION, FAMILY VALUES
GOLD EATER: by Wayan; 1993/1/15 dream drawn as 9-page comic.
I'm an orphan shapeshifter enslaved by a gold-eating monster. But I meet a cat-girl with a hammer...
CAUTION: BAD FOSTER-DAD; CAPITALIST MONSTER; VIOLENCE (TO VENDING MACHINES)
THE GOLDEN PAW: by Wayan; 2009/4/12, a dream on speaking up
An Oxford teaching assistant sexually blackmails one of his law students, but to his shock she goes public...
GOSPEL GIRL: by Wayan; 1986/11/17, a stubborn dream.
I'm a girl in a desert who God tells to preach a new gospel. But the locals, unlike ancient Rome, have guns...
CAUTION: VIOLENT MARTYRDOM
GRAMPA GOT AIMED: by Wayan; 1987/6/17, a psychic dream.
The girl I love has a family that'll stop at absolutely nothing to destroy us. But I'll fight for love...
CAUTION: SEX; EMOTIONAL VIOLENCE; MOLESTATION HISTORY
A GREAT NIGHTMARE, or, The Autistic Dream Lecturer: by Wayan; 1997/1/2, a diagnostic nightmare.
I dream I'm addressing a dream convention, but I'm autistic! I MUST act bizarre, just to function...
GROUNDHOG DAY: by Wayan; 1994/9/2, a dream-comic (or text with pix)
James Hillman is the first psychologist on the moon! He sees a shadow and
panics like a groundhog--mistakes it for Death. Not his own shadow, but MINE...
GUARD ON THE BEACH: by Wayan; 1980/9/17, a dream of moral suasion
Very nearly a nightmare, till the guard on the beach relented in the face of people power...
GYRLFALCON: by Wayan; 1971/11/26, a genderbent, speciesbent & predictive dream
I'm a Gyrlfalcon in a theater, fighting the Wolverine and his Morlocks with my lover the Green Lion...
A HAUNTED HOUSE INDEED!: by Anna Kingsford; 1887/4/12, an epic ghost dream
I was warned about soul-devouring art in the haunted house, but I didn't expect to find an entire art salon...
CAUTION: ABSORBING ARTWORK
HER ONLY FRIEND: by Wayan; 1996/7/1, a dream of worms turning.
A sorceress trains a kid as a prostitute who'll spy on her powerful clients. But her training has side effects...
CAUTION: EXPLOITED KIDS
HOBBIT SNIPER: by Wayan; 1998/10/13, a dream on strategy.
I'm a sniper in a desert battle of men against hobbits. Guilty for not fighting openly, but that'd be suicidal...
CAUTION: MATH AND WAR
THE HONEST INMATE: by Wayan; 1997/5/8, a dreamfable on truthfulness.
I'm a psychopath in a prison for the insane. But I fall in love, and change. Blunt honesty fuels the change...
I GOT OUT: by Wayan; 1992/1/4, a psychic dream drawn as a 9-page digital comic
I flee our love triangle when Abe turns mean. He's telepathic, but
I have my escape all planned: the goldfish, the snakepit, the caves...
CAUTION: THREESOME, SNAKES, MOTORCYCLE FATALITY
THE ILL-FORMED TALE: by Wayan; 160K, 1981/4/7, a wild dream anti-epic.
To reach the Peak of Happiness on the Isle of Dreams, I must pass four Perils--but they're all backwards...
CAUTION: RELIGIOUS NUTS, KNIVES, NUDE ALIENS, BACKWARD PLOT...
I'M NOT THE DIRECTOR!: by Federico Fellini; Oct. 1961, a dream pun on denying your lifework
I'm the director of an airport. A mysterious Mongolian traveler lands. Let him in
or not? I try to avoid the decision by lying--say "I'm not the director!"...
IN A REHEARSAL ROOM: by Wayan; 1982/10/20, a sexy dreamlet on shyness.
I dreamed my fears faded like ghosts, as we made love in the rehearsal room. But invisible is not gone...
CAUTION: UNDERAGE SEX
IN WOMEN'S PRISON: by Wayan; 1994/7/23, a dream of faith.
A woman in prison loves her counselor, but she's a barely literate hooker--she knows he won't love her back...
INTERNAL SCROLL: by Carolee Schneemann, 1975, an embarrassing dream acted out on stage
I dreamed I was pulling a scroll out of my vagina and reading it like a tickertape. I was
reluctant to perform the dream--I knew I'd get into trouble!--but I felt compelled...
CAUTION: NUDITY
JIM'S POWDER: by Helen; pre-1961, a telepathic warning dream
I dreamt I was begging Jim not to kill himself, but when I woke, I couldn't bring myself to call. I hardly knew him...
CAUTION: GUILT OVER (PREVENTABLE?) DEATH
KELLY FIELD: by an air cadet, 1941; an almost-lifesaving dream.
I dreamed a plane took off northeast, and flipped by the main hangar, killing two men. I forgot the dream until...
KICK HER: by Wayan; 1994/8/9, a gameshow nightmare.
I'm a blonde gameshow bimbo. Each week, I'm beaten up. Ha ha ha! But my bruises are real. At last, I...
CAUTION: GAMESHOW FROM HELL
KINGMAKERS: by Wayan; 2000/2/21, a dream of mediation.
I'm a political aide to the leader of a hot-tempered, clawed, fanged alien people. And then my boss dies...
A KNIFE AT HIS THROAT: by Wayan; 1991/1/1; a political dream-cartoon-fable
A courtroom hostage-drama where I'm forced to commit... tracheotomy! And then the Gulf War begins...
CAUTION: CARTOON VIOLENCE
A LAKE DEMON: by Wayan; 1979/11/3, an anti-lucid dream.
I walk through worlds, fight a deadly lake demon, and work magic--but I mustn't go lucid...
LAURIE ANDERSON SHENANIGANS: by Larissa King, art by Jesse Reklaw; pre-2000; a surreal dream
I'm watching MTV. Laurie Anderson gets inside my remote control. I try to change channels
and she turns my head into an apple. I grope for a potato peeler, and carve a new mouth...
LILY THE LION: by Wayan; 1991/4/7, a small psychic dream.
My housemate Lily is a lion. She bursts into my room. Stare-down. And then she pounces. So I...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE! MUTUAL GLARING! THE VULCAN NERVE PINCH!
LILY OXYGEN: by Wayan; dreamed 1984/1/19, drawn 2000; a strong psychic dream.
I'm Emily Dickinson reborn in 2100 as a breeder of hydroponic lilies, till my dad drafts me as
an Arctic energy-prospector, where I meet a ghost, a fiery Beast, a new me, and the girl of my dreams...
CAUTION: QUEER-POSITIVE, NUDE PROSPECTORS, GNOMIC DICKINSON QUOTES
THE LIMIT OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE: by Wayan; 1974/3/13, a dream of madness.
Deep in the caves, a Voice announces I've gone as far as the human mind can stand. But ahead, I see...
LITTLE NEMO'S BED: by Winsor McCay; c. 1906, a famous if probably fictional dream icon
Little Nemo's bed gets restless and takes him for a wild ride through town and up onto roofs...
THE LIZARD LESSON: by Wayan; 1996/12/12, a hard-hittin' shamanic dream.
I'm a shaman in Nunavut who has to teach a guy in a lizard
suit (and his foxy niece) that reparations have limits...
LOON LADDER: by Wayan; 1993/5/13. A dream of rising above.
I had this near-nightmare about climbing a DNA stair up to the sky, and stepping off...
CAUTION: NUDITY, INCEST ISSUES
MAGIC SCHOOL: by Wayan, 1982/1/26: a waking event and replying dream.
Phyllis Schlafly, killer of the Equal Rights Amendment, provokes a dream of being Captain Kirk
trapped in a magic school with no way out but the graduate exam. Can I learn the lesson of the tree?
CAUTION: POLITICAL JOURNALISM BEFORE THE DREAM. OH NO!
MAHAKALA, MOZART, AND THE CRIPPLED BIRD: by Wayan; 1985/4/17, a dream on facing shadows
The Christian God vs Mahakala, Buddhist god of right anger! War in Middle Earth, as Pink Floyd sings...
MELTDOWN VALLEY: by Wayan; 1993/2/13, a dream of scrupulous balance.
A park in San Francisco has melted into a bizarre mutation-zone. Its guardian is a lonely elf-woman...
CAUTION: ELF NUDITY
MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN: by Wayan; 1992/9/5-6, a literary/diagnostic dream.
I'm in a tribe of post-Crash kids with psychic powers, trying to keep nukes from rising again...
CAUTION: CHILD SOLDIERS
THE MIRANDA OATH: by Wayan; 1998/2/24, a subtly predictive political dream.
Strange oaths are proposed for the first expedition to the Uranian moon Miranda...
MIRRORCUNT: by Wayan; 2011/3/24, a peculiar erotic dream image
After singing dream songs on stage, I dream of a girl on a talkshow displaying the strangest vagina in history...
CAUTION: NUDITY
THE MOUSE BANNER: by Wayan; 1986/9/4, a dream fable.
I'm a mouse with a protest banner saying "FREEDOM!", having a slight argument with a cat...
MOVING: by Roswila, 2007/10/13 and 2007/10/23; a recurring dreamku
My dreams support a radical break from my past--to let go of possessions and friends in a cross-country move...
MY PAST CHANGES SO: by Wayan; 1985, a poem on healing-stages.
It takes time to build yourself out of found objects and trash...
MY SINE-FRIEND: by Wayan; 1984/3/6, an emotional dream of time and rebirth.
An animal-girl I know lives like a sine-wave, first forward in time, then backwards, dying at every zero...
MY THREE HUSBANDS: by Wayan; 1981/2/26 & 1991/5/26, dreams drawn as a 15-page comic
I'm three women at once! We marry a unicorn, a goat philosopher,
and a magic talking cat. But cops raid our furry commune...
CAUTION: INTERSPECIES MARRIAGE, TEEN SEX, BAD COPS
MY WILDCAT WOUND: by Wayan; 1994/7/8, a dream on gender trauma.
I'm a wildcat in a cat/fox team led by a woman who wants us to merge with a man/wolf team...
CAUTION: LANGUAGE
NAIAD AND GOD-DOG: by Wayan; 1980/11/7, a manipulative dream-tragedy.
I love a Naiad who's lost her God. Tragedy strikes us. I'm devastated till I meet the aliens who explain...
NANCY AND KIT: by Wayan; 1994/1/3, a dream about mislabeling.
In a psychodrama scene, I try to stop a furious guy from hitting an exhibitionist girl. But I'm bleeding...
THE NIGHT MY NUMBER CAME UP: by Sir Victor Goddard, Jan. 1946, a predictive dream
At a party in Shanghai, I overheard a fellow RAF officer say he dreamt that my flight to Tokyo
would crash. I didn't worry much, since he'd seen seven passengers, and my flight next morning
did not... until three last-minute passengers came on board! The plane iced up, and crashed...
A NIGHT ON MOUNT DIABLO: by Wayan, 1984/6/8, an allegorical four-phase dream.
I'm attacked by a narcissist firebird, a rabid rattler-manticore, a masochist bear, and a sexless succubus...
CAUTION: INEPT DEMONS
NOT THREE!: by Wayan; 1996/11/11, an encouraging nightmare
I was wrong. I didn't survive three assassins. It's been seven! Why'd I forget the others?
ONCE A HERO: by Wayan; 1998/10/22-25, 17 images, a raw dream-series.
Sexy dreams of Chinese archeology, authorized by the fairies, make me face that my family abused me...
OPENING: by Wayan, 1992; incubated automatic drawing
Why don't I push for more art shows? I asked how I feel at shows of my own work, and this came out...
ORDEAL BY INFRASTRUCTURE: by Wayan; 1987/11/22, a Clintonian dreamtale--before Clinton!
I want to join the inner circle of America's political elite.
But to do that I have to survive the Ordeal by Infrastructure...
OUR GOVERNOR: by Wayan; 1990/3/28, an anti-death-penalty dream.
I force the governor's chief aide to tour the new prisons for us artists, fags, and niggers.
He's appalled--but how many more noses must I rub in the governor's racism?
CAUTION: THE N-WORD
THE PARABLE OF THE CAVE: by Wayan; 1993/9/18, an antisocial dream.
Plato never did say what shed the light that cast those shadows on his cave wall. I find out.
CAUTION: CUT-RATE APOCALYPSE
PERISSA: by Wayan; 1997/9/13, a sexy dream-comic (small screen, slow loading? Illus. text)
When Perissa, an exhibitionistic centaur, bares her body in a crowded Coliseum,
she also bares a human-supremacist plot...
CAUTION: EXHIBITIONISM, SPECISM
PERPETUA'S LAST DREAM: by St Perpetua; 203 CE, a flying, sex-changing, defiant dream.
Facing death the next day in a Roman arena, Perpetua dreams of the spiritual duel behind the physical one...
PINBALL SHOWDOWN: by Wayan; 1995/3/18, a flirty game-playing dream.
I suspect the pinball champion of Jupiter is cheating. I try to scare her psychic confederate out of hiding...
THE PROWLER: by Wayan; 1997/2/4, an anti-nightmare.
My sister hears a prowler. I go out blind in the dark, and learn she's right. But what a strange intruder!
PUMA ORGY: by Wayan; 1988/2/5, erasable crayon drawing of a dream.
I dreamed I had to go through the Animal Orgy to get to the City of the Shining Spirits on the horizon...
CAUTION: STRANGE SEX
RABBIT WORLD: by Wayan; 6-page comic of a 1990/9/26 shamanic dream.
I'm a telepathic rabbit defending our world from space-laser attack. We do, but do we modernize too much?
CAUTION: IDEAS
RAGS TO RICHES: A FIGHT FOR LOVE: by Hyal; October 2006, a dream of courage.
I was just a street rat, but I danced with the princess at a ball, and fell in love. Three rich suitors pulled their blades...
THE RED BEAST WAS HAPPY: by Wayan; dreamed 1981/11/16, drawn 1983/11, a subtle healing dream
I was timid. Red scared me. But this huge confident dream-beast hinted at a new energy...
REDUCED TO THE STUDHOUSE: by Wayan; 1980/11/16, a warning dream.
I'm not a normal wolf: I'm a were-woman. When I turn wolf again, I'm in heat; but I want to be alone! So...
CAUTION: SEX TALK
REFLECTIONS IN THE POOL: by Wayan; 184K total, 2 panoramas; a 1994/7/2 dream.
Night. A mirror-maze of contradictory preachings. But in the secret mermaid pool, I find love.
Then... sphinx-angels war in the air! A war of riddles. Can I, a batwinged devil, make peace?
CAUTION: SEX, NUDITY, MEAN ANGELS, AND ONE HAPPY DEVIL
ROAR!: by Wayan; 2000/4/3, a nightmare transformed by a bluff
Night. A jungle full of prowling lions and leopards. So naturally, I get up on a rock and roar back...
SALIA AND CHUR: by Wayan; 1989/2/25, a psychic Star Trek dream.
Our starship signs up a strange new woman whose quirks turn out to be fallout from slavery...
CAUTION: SEX, ABUSE ISSUES
THE SEMI-INTELLIGENT ANIMAL PROBLEM: by Wayan; 1986/4/6, a dream of impulse.
The army breeds super-smart animals. Scientists fear they'll
upset ecosystems, if freed. No one speaks for the creatures...
CAUTION: DIRECT ACTION
THE SERMON OF CARMEN DOG: by Wayan; 1990/9/10, the ultimate public-speaking nightmare.
Animal poets at an open mic. My turn! And I find... I'm one. A creature without grammar...
THE SEX WORKSHOP: by Wayan; 1997/4/6, a dream on taking the next step.
The teacher of our sex workshop picks me for a demonstration in front of everyone. Gulp...
CAUTION: WELL WHAT DO YOU THINK?
SHOOT ME, I'M LUCID!: by Wayan; 1997/10/17, a predictive didactic nightmare.
I distract a mad gunman in a crowd. I suspect I'm dreaming, but it still seems a bit too noble...
CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS ON CRAZED KILLERS AT HOME
SIEGFRIED MUST DIE: by Carl Jung; 1913/12/18, an archetypal (and predictive?) dream.
Jung and a little brown man shoot down Siegfried the German Hero, riding his chariot of bones. Wait... his what?
CAUTION: GRIM
SILKY CROSSES THE ATLANTIC: by Wayan; dreamed 1982/8/24, painted 1994 (acrylic/ink/xerox).
After I fled my batterer, I was afraid to love--afraid I'd give up my freedom again for mere kindness...
SILKY'S REVOLUTION: by Wayan; 1995/9/4, a historical dream.
I'm in an alternate-history American Revolution with Silky the
talking black mare. We sail for Europe as diplomats...
SLAVES ON RED MARS: by Wayan; 1999/8/15, a dreamfable on will.
As Mars demands independence from Earth, Jovians enslave us all! Now freedom-fighting is personal...
SMOKING REX: by Wayan; 1989/3/29, a dream of unlikely alliance.
A cigar-smoking tyrannosaur moves into our neighborhood,
upsetting us bluebirds and vampire bats. So we...
SNOW by Nancy Price; 1948, a false-waking dream about living vs survival
Lost in the snow, I must give my baby to a stranger or let my dad put him in a box, safe, forever...
SNOW STALLION: by Wayan; 1994/6/4, a tangled political/spiritual dream.
I'm a peace terrorist trapped in Squaw Valley, herded like a mare by a huge stallion made of snow...
And then the dream shifts. I blurt out the truth behind our idiotic waking world! And wake believing it...
CAUTION: MERMAID AND HORSE NUDITY
SOUL-BOARD: by Wayan; 1989/1/12, a dream poem.
Africa. My horse trusted me as we faced lions and fire, but to face the Soul-Board, he must trust himself...
SQUIRREL GIRL: by Wayan; 1973/10/19, a dream poem of love & rockets
Squirrel Girl and I try to find a private room, but Hal the mad computer in 2001
spies on us and our spaceship captain orders us to clean the ion tubes...
CAUTION: SQUIRREL NUDITY
STABBED ALIVE: by Roswila; 2007/10/9, a nightmare-poem
I defeat the knife-wielder, in spite the blade in my belly I can't pull out. I may have to let it be...
STOCKDEN'S MURDER: by Elizabeth Greenwood; Dec 1695-Jan 1696, six dreams solving a murder.
Greenwood dreamt her murdered neighbor's ghost gave her tips helping her catch his three killers...
STOMPERS: by Wayan; 2013/8/24, a surreal dream of confidence
I dream I'm a runner named Silky; but straying outside the crowd can get you stomped by giant aliens...
TAG WITH A BOUNTY HUNTER: by "Caradon"; 2010/3/3, a playful lucid dream
A bounty hunter stalks me through a jungle, but lucidity turns a potential nightmare to joy...
THE TALE OF A MISFIT COCK: by Wayan; 1999/1/25, a media-fable dream.
I'm in Japan, where Rumiko Takahashi tells me of a tragic chicken
who longs to be a lounge singer...
TAROT: DREAMTIGER! (Strength): by Wayan; Tarot card, 3x5", summer 1979.
Find your strength in dreams: facing (and befriending) what you've feared, or fought...
THE TEACHER: by Lord Vivian, 1874; a predictive dream he bet on... for another!
DREAM: a stranger tells me "The Teacher" won the Handicap. AWAKE: At the track I meet the man in my dream! He
says The Teacher is now called Aldrich. But Aldrich's owner discourages me. A friend trusts my dream & wins £1,000...
TERRIBLE HORSE: by Louise Bogan; 1941, poem of a healing dream
A stallion reared to strike me. He was all the fear and rage I’d repressed... A woman said “offer him...
THE THREATENERS: by Wayan; 1997/4/23, a small psychic dream.
Two gunmen break in, call me by a strange name, and demand I repay a loan I never borrowed...
THREE FLYING DREAMS: by Sharad Chandra, 1988 or before, mystical advisory dreams
1: I ask how to fly. "Breathe air from high levels; its light and purity will wash away earth's heaviness..."
2: To join a flying game, you must cut off your own head! Players acquire new heads and can work miracles...
3: I float up to reach a book in a shop. People call the police but I defiantly soar--over Paris, up to the stars...
TIAMAT'S REBELLION: by Wayan; 1988/1/1, a dream about neoteny.
That day: I read of a young healer in rural Indonesia harassed by the local mullah.
That night: I dream she leads a revolution on a starship against her elders...
TIMEDOORS OF THE GODS: by Wayan; 1998/2/17, a mysterious initiatory dream.
I'm mortal, yet I'm offered a residency in the Commune of the Gods,
along with Xena the Amazon Warrior and... Little Red Riding Hood?
TOWER OF THE MARTIAN DEAD: by Wayan, 1983/7/7; a dream-poem of an exo-Valhalla
Climbing a mountain on Mars, I reach a hall where I'm transformed into a cryophilic being.
Then I feast on methane soup with the heroic Martian dead...
TRESPASSERS IN MALANCHAI: by Hyal; Feb 1996, an epic dream with a psychic intrusion.
A maneless lion-boy wins his people's respect. While training, he sees weird trespassers
who seem to be from someone else's dream... and ten years later, he finds that dreamer.
TURNABOUT: by Henry James; 1870s or 80s; a nightmare reversed by sheer courage.
A night-fiend strove to open the door I held shut between us--
until I realized I too was terrible, and opened it to find a great...
CAUTION: THE DREADED PROSE OF HENRY JAMES
UNCERTAIN HORIZON: by Cécile Brun; 2014/11/20, a dream-comic of a sea serpent
My partner and I were hunting for spirits with a camera designed to photograph them. Warned
away from the Niigata waterfront, we try to catch a bus out. But what comes isn't the bus...
AN UNDERCOVER TROLL: by Wayan; 1994/7/6, a dream of personal growth taken too far...
Disguised as a literary troll, I spy on the Neo-Nazis, but my disguise
can't last much longer: I ate a magical herb, and I'm growing...
AN UNEXPECTED MOVE: by Wayan; 1998/12/17, a peripatetic dreamtale.
In the Los Angeles ruins, a wizard-gang jumps us. Desperate, I try a crazy un-Angeleno move: I use my feet...
UNGIRDLE THE TREE: by Wayan; dreamed 2018/10/6, a shamanic warning dream
I'm a girl living alone in a forest. I go patrolling after a storm and find a red cable
strangling a tree. Though scared, I climb up and tear it off. But there are more...
CAUTION: POLITICAL INTERPRETATION
VAGUELY IN A SICK DREAM: by Jack Kerouac, late Nov. 1953, a dream of cooperative sacrifice
Us guys take turns getting pounded by this fist of cloud that must never hit
the world. It hammers my skull and retreats; we laugh and switch positions...
A VALLEY NEAR HOPE: by Wayan; 1984/10/17-19, an epic dream.
I wander a valley where unicorns love cyborgs but fear giant ants, who love unicorns but
fear cyborgs, who love ants but fear unicorns! And while the Three Tribes squabble, cave-monsters
sculpt them all. I set up peace talks between these four aspects of my tetrahedral soul...
CAUTION: SWEARING, DRUNK LIONS, CYBORG SURGERY, AND GOGGLE-BARFING
THE VAT MESSIAH: by Wayan; 1985/2/27, an epic dream of magic, flight, and sex
In our cult, we lie in vats of goo till we grow wings. But we're feared more than we knew...
CAUTION: SPECIST LYNCH MOB, NUDE IN SCHOOL, LESBIAN FEELINGS, OBSCENE CARROT
VERTICAL PLANES: by Wayan; 1990/3/7, an astral pirate dream.
We're air pirates running a music shop, till our biplanes are hijacked by cat angels! Furious, we set out...
VIEWFINDER: by Jenny Badger Sultan; 2000/5/31, a dream-ritual declined
A friend explained she planned to be a human viewfinder, bendng into
an arch for a male spirit to dive through. I didn't want to risk it...
THE VOICE OF GOD: by Wayan, 1993/1/31, a psychic nightmare-epic.
Half-mad with fear, I massacre a cult, till my gun manifests stigmata: a gory miracle.
Then I'm a cultist, resisting the Voice of God pushing all us mortals to murder in His name.
I woke up haunted, and wondered for weeks what this was about... until the Waco Massacre.
CAUTION: CREEPY VIOLENCE, CREEPY GOD, CREEPY PREDICTION
WAPATO BIRDS: by Wayan; 1986/2/2, a subtly psychic dream.
I'm a Wapato Bird: part crane, part elk, part tree-bud. Despite my
shyness, I must lead our people's migration to the Grand Teton lakes...
WASHINGTON'S DUNE: by Wayan; 1992/1/18, a dream on perseverance.
George Washington faces sniper fire, kamikaze birds
and critics claiming the fight for freedom is doomed...
WATERSHIP DOWNTRODDEN: by Wayan; 1983/6/22, a dream of another life.
I'm an intelligent rabbit in an alphamale's harem, organizing a feminist movement...
WE MARCHED THROUGH THE CITY OF SAINT FRANCIS: by Wayan; 1982/5/1?, a dream-tinged poem.
After a peace march in San Francisco, I saw us as deer, and Americans as dogs. Yet WE frighten THEM...
WEREWOLF TRANSFERENCE: by Larry Vigon; fall 1997?; a nightmare reversed by courage
Chased by the old movie Wolfman, I get tired of fear and turn on the monster. I take on his wolfness!
But in me, wolf-nature manifests differently--as a human body with a calm, happy wolf's head...
WHAT MEN HIDE BEHIND: by Wayan; 1992/11/30, an alarming comic dream
The real pursuit of happiness: she pursues me, and I run in shame and hide! But she's persistent...
WHY COWGIRLS LOVE BROCCOLI: by Wayan; 1987/8/19, a surreal dream of love.
I'm a cowgirl in Nevada circa 1900. In the canyon below Haunted Mansion,
I meet a broccoli-green lizard girl. Naturally I help a lady in distress...
CAUTION: QUEER-POSITIVE
WHY PROGRESS IS SLOW: by Wayan; 1991/1/26 & 2/16, twin timetravel dreams
Time-hopping through centuries, I learn how slow
deep social change is. How we cling to the old horrors!
THE WILD HUNT: by Wayan; 1998/7/24, a dream of myth--or abuse?.
We're exploring the English farm we inherited, when The Wild Hunt storms over the hill...
WING IT: by Wayan, 1995/12/29-1996/2/14, a 9-page improv comic.
An art experiment--the only rule is DRAW without preconceptions--
no models, no ideas, no plans, not even dreams. Drawing from the void!
WINTER DREAMS: by Jenny Badger Sultan; winter 2004/2005, a painted series of color-dreams.
After teaching a class on color, I had a series of vivid dreams
about color, and tried fusing them into one painting...
A WORLD DIES WELL: by Wayan; 1981/12/6, a dream of reconciliation.
A world-mind I never really liked dies generously, helping others; so I make my peace with it...
WYVERN: by Wayan; 1997/9/3 to 9/18, 22" ceramic sculpture; recurring dream figure.
I dreamed of a dragon-woman on a reef. She was my guardian, but she let me drown! She had her reasons...
CAUTION: SCALY NUDITY
YATAGHAN: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, c.1840?, a dream of rescue--and summoning
Night street. Two masked assassins attack a woman. I intervene. But I need a weapon!
I picture the Turkish sword on my mantel. The yataghan appears in my hand and I...
YEW: by Mrs. Cl. of S.; 1670 or 71; a risky dream-prescription.
In a dream, a dead friend told Mrs. Cl. how to cure her daughter's chronic illness: the yew tree. But yew is toxic...
YOU NEED TO FIND HER: by B. Bigham; 2010/4/27, a strong psychic dream of history
I walked into a 19th century home--and family quarrel. Decades passed in seconds; then
the house burned--with me in it. Two years later I learned the house and its history were real...
YOU REALLY AREN'T LUNCH; 2012/6/11 by Maia Spencer; a cledonic dream of facing fears
Hiding in the woods I meet a Cyclops. But I'm not me, I'm the editor of the World Dream Bank...


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