2013
Dream as Alain Guiraudie
Artefact: Film, ‘Stranger by the Lake’ directed by Alain Guiraudie, first screened in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes Film Festival, 17 May 2013.
Bright is dangerous, too
Even if the light is fading by the end
Dimming and disappearing through the scrawny trees
The rock-rubble turning blue, then vanishing
Desire
And its counterpart
Risk
Already laid out on the shore
Not gone home
To a restaurant
A different location
But, still here, at this place
Spread out flat
Like a dry towel over everything
As the heat comes up
As the tyres return to the parking lot
As the shallow water warms
Waiting to swallow the men’s bodies
Bring them in to the deep
This is the thing with dreams
The world looks a certain way
But the simple rules no longer apply
Nightmares not being tied tightly
To the nighttime
You can put your hand out to grasp the image
But the data will melt
Sun and lake water pixelating into pieces through your fingers
It’s not possible to hold onto
Light equalling safety
Simplicity
To not-seeing
Meaning the same as sin
Not now
When all things become about
Skin
Proximity
The place where a body might be hidden in the scrub
About the breath of a person
Holding itself, waiting
Getting loud and close
Right beside
Until it fills the nostrils
Tobacco
Mint gum
Alain knows a lot of things
Has good proprioception
Knows that he is smart
But smart enough too
To know that he doesn’t know
Everything
Over these last nights, though
With the picture playing through his mind repeatedly
Just some small variations
He’s becoming surer
Noticing that his dreamworld and the waking world
Are not dissimilar
Can sense that the substructures consist of the same forms
Everything built the same
The rules
There and here
Following the same outline
If he were to reach down under the surface
Feel for the shape of the spine
The way things go
He knows what he’d find
Even if the light is fading by the end
Dimming and disappearing through the scrawny trees
The rock-rubble turning blue, then vanishing
Desire
And its counterpart
Risk
Already laid out on the shore
Not gone home
To a restaurant
A different location
But, still here, at this place
Spread out flat
Like a dry towel over everything
As the heat comes up
As the tyres return to the parking lot
As the shallow water warms
Waiting to swallow the men’s bodies
Bring them in to the deep
This is the thing with dreams
The world looks a certain way
But the simple rules no longer apply
Nightmares not being tied tightly
To the nighttime
You can put your hand out to grasp the image
But the data will melt
Sun and lake water pixelating into pieces through your fingers
It’s not possible to hold onto
Light equalling safety
Simplicity
To not-seeing
Meaning the same as sin
Not now
When all things become about
Skin
Proximity
The place where a body might be hidden in the scrub
About the breath of a person
Holding itself, waiting
Getting loud and close
Right beside
Until it fills the nostrils
Tobacco
Mint gum
Alain knows a lot of things
Has good proprioception
Knows that he is smart
But smart enough too
To know that he doesn’t know
Everything
Over these last nights, though
With the picture playing through his mind repeatedly
Just some small variations
He’s becoming surer
Noticing that his dreamworld and the waking world
Are not dissimilar
Can sense that the substructures consist of the same forms
Everything built the same
The rules
There and here
Following the same outline
If he were to reach down under the surface
Feel for the shape of the spine
The way things go
He knows what he’d find