Nightmares and Dreams

In the dream I was watching torture
Others were watching with robotic unfeeling eyes from the other side of a wall

I woke up and realized
With radical eyes
radicalized

I realized
That right now in Hyderabad children were mourning their headless dead father
That right now schemes were being made for the overtake of Venezuela
That right now women were being publicly stoned to death for suspected infidelity
That right now presidents are planning to bomb buildings and people in Iran
That right now prime ministers are allowing or encouraging people to be flown out of the world’s watchful eye into prisons where they will be tortured, and tortured, and then killed when they return home.

How do I go back to sleep?

Right now, I sell cars for a living
I sell diesel cars that can run on modified or unmodified vegetable oil
Fields and vats that don’t need to be guarded with snipers and mortar rounds
But that can’t be enough

I need to do some other thing as well
Something more direct
Something more, period

I will need help with this
I will need the support I offer to you
To do the same thing

I thought this would be enough
That every day I can make a small real difference
That every day I can sell one or two more cars with a badge that says:
I’m trying not to kill as many trees as before
I’m not trying to wipe out as much bird habitat as before
I’m trying not to kill as many Nigerian oil rig workers as before
I’m trying not to give corporations as many reasons to lobby my congressperson to send warheads into suspected underground nuclear facilities.

And sadly for my friends and family, perhaps
I must do more

And sadly for me,
I don’t know what it is yet I must do
To be most effective
To make the best use of 40 more potential years of life

Sad because I might turn out to be a different person altogether
That I’m not exactly they person my wife thinks she married
That inside me was a person who was willing to die
So others might not have to kill or be killed themselves.

And how would I die?
Hit by a truck in North Dakota while walking from Washington to Washington?
Drowned while chained to a boat in Bremerton?
Crushed by the wheels of a transport plane bound for Baquba, sent from Fort Lewis?
Heart Attack from screaming for hours in Olympia?
I have no idea right now

I just know I can’t go back to sleep tonight,
And I will need your help to make sure others can.