Metamorphosis 3: A Passage from Philip K. Dick’s VALIS

In my interconnected dreams
I live another life—sometimes
I drive north in my red Capri
to my house on the shore of the lake—

I enjoy working with my wife
in the garden—she is slim and
attractive and loves to smile—
we tend to the wild roses planted

near the retaining wall in our
back yard—the house next to us is
a mansion—we’re quite modest in
comparison. And for an hour

after I awake from these dreams
I can still see in my mind’s eye
my wife in her blue jeans, dragging
the garden hose across the driveway.

And yet I am not married—I
have never loved anyone as
deeply as I love my wife in
my dreams—I live in an apartment—

I would never feel comfortable
in an upper-middle class life—
and to my knowledge there is no
such lake in the north one could drive to.

I am different from how I am
in these dreams. These dreams baffle me—
I awake disoriented,
living a double life—wondering

which one is really more fulfilling—
the life I have when awake
or the one which seduces me,
those long peaceful drives north, to the lake?

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I may have more to say about these metamorphosis poems later. But I felt compelled to share this given the news that Dick has been given a volume in the Library of America series (see below).