The Dream of a Fire Engine

Without the sun filtered through closed eyelids,

without the siren along the service road,

without Grandpa’s ginger-colored hair,

Mother’s lipstick, Daughter’s manicure,

firecrackers, a monkey’s ass, a cherry, Rei’s lost elephant,

without communist or past tense,

or a character seeing her own chopped-off feet dancing in fairy slippers,

or Mao’s favorite novel about a chamber —

the scientist of sleep has claimed

that without warm blood a creature cannot dream.