The bridge
I dream of bridges. Or more specifically I dream of a bridge. But it is different every night or different all at once while still being the same, the way it happens in dreams. So I can still say that I dream of bridges. Which is not really that strange. I am making a bridge after all. Or more accurately the company I work for makes the bridge. A huge, steel bridge. Every day I watch it taking shape, changing from boring, flat plates of steel to something more intricate. When I walk on the shop floor the smell of metal being welded invades my nostrils, the light from the welding arcs burns in my retinas the outline of the metal parts and the metal dust from the grinding gets stuck on my clothes and powders my skin a dull metal grey. I breathe the bridge in every day and I dream of it every night.
It is there, its huge metal body solid in the ebbing currents of my dreamland. Its metal arches branching off, twisting in impossible bends and curls, flowery curlicues that defy mathematics and mock every designer’s initial intentions. A geometry that goes against the fundamental laws set in our world at once terrifying and darkly attractive, shining and sparkling in the dream light. Sometimes the metal parts become partly organic and the bridge blows up in an orgy of vegetation, huge trees wrapped in dark green ivy, loaded with flowers in an explosion of neon colours that hurt my eyes. Other times it is made of huge crystal pillars, cut with archaic designs and ancient forgotten runes that pulse with a strange light, the crystal pillars becoming sandstone ones further down the length of the bridge, wind slashed, carved snakes twisting around the bodies of the pillars, fragments of gold leaf still sticking on their once polished sandstone bodies. One time it was a bridge made of tattered black lace and old grey ribbons, the atmosphere the sepia colour of an old photograph, the lace body of the bridge like the last insistent fragment of a memory that wishes to disappear from the last mind still trying to hold it…I have dreamt of a bridge made of leather bound books, old yellowing paper and dry dust, the yellowing paper marked with letters of unknown alphabets, half erased sketches, and faded ink stains, a bridge made of stories so old that were dead and forgotten long before the oldest legends were born. I have dreamt of an origami bridge, endless sheets of paper folded, creased and pressed upon themselves, creating delicate arches festooned with more origami flowers and garlands of silver scissors. There was a bridge made of sea bitten wood, wrapped in rusty chains, old sea woes and laments spelled out with shells on the pillars, the muted shine of pearls humming the tune of promises eroded by salty tears. There was another made of bones joined with silver pins and wire, bead strings made of onyx and amethyst wrapped around the arches, spider silk banners hanging from the balustrades, old battles painted on them in purple ink. One was made of Legos, millions of colourful bricks assembled in intricately impossible ways, in ways that only exist in childhood imaginary landscapes that no Danish designer will ever walk again. Another made of black and grey smoke, a writhing bridge that was constantly moving but staying in place, the smoke smelling of thousands of burning spices. Still another was made of boiled sweets, all colours and shapes, a vast sweet mosaic of a bridge, supported by striped candy canes, the atmosphere smelling of sugar and rosewater and lemon and mint. And a bridge made of raindrops, shimmering in the light, wrapped in flashing rainbows.
There have been hundreds of bridges, each one distinct from the other but always the same bridge. There are never any people or live birds or animals. I can never see where the bridge ends, just where it starts. I cannot see if there is a river underneath, a deep gorge or a flaming sea. I am not sure if the bridge is anchored in the ground of just floating in the currents of my dreams. I am not sure what it is supposed to symbolise if dreams really are symbols of something. But I am sure of the lament that pervades the dream, the ancient longing of the wife of the master stonemason, built alive in the foundation of the bridge to make it stand, an innocent sacrifice to the gods, to pacify them for the hubris they feel men have committed in defying the obstacles they set to them.
Maybe I visit her dreams in my sleep, her half-forgotten images of her sort life, her eroded memories of what joy was, her love for the hand that laid the stones around her even as she was wishing them lifeless as the last stone was put in place, her angry bitterness at what was taken away from her, her understanding of why this cruelty is necessary to the order of the world and her desperate hope for a last minute salvation that never came and will never come. Maybe my dream bridge is her bridge, all the things that she never had the time to tell and never had the time to fully understand that assume the form of her prison grave and are let loose in dreamland for wandering dreamers to encounter. And the wonder and amazement they feel and the thought they may spare her is a small relief and a little balm to that eternal longing. I am not sure of were the bridge leads, whether it is a puzzle, an invitation or a trap. I have never dared to cross it…
I dream of bridges. Or more specifically I dream of a bridge. But it is different every night or different all at once while still being the same, the way it happens in dreams. So I can still say that I dream of bridges. Which is not really that strange. I am making a bridge after all. Or more accurately the company I work for makes the bridge. A huge, steel bridge. Every day I watch it taking shape, changing from boring, flat plates of steel to something more intricate. When I walk on the shop floor the smell of metal being welded invades my nostrils, the light from the welding arcs burns in my retinas the outline of the metal parts and the metal dust from the grinding gets stuck on my clothes and powders my skin a dull metal grey. I breathe the bridge in every day and I dream of it every night.
It is there, its huge metal body solid in the ebbing currents of my dreamland. Its metal arches branching off, twisting in impossible bends and curls, flowery curlicues that defy mathematics and mock every designer’s initial intentions. A geometry that goes against the fundamental laws set in our world at once terrifying and darkly attractive, shining and sparkling in the dream light. Sometimes the metal parts become partly organic and the bridge blows up in an orgy of vegetation, huge trees wrapped in dark green ivy, loaded with flowers in an explosion of neon colours that hurt my eyes. Other times it is made of huge crystal pillars, cut with archaic designs and ancient forgotten runes that pulse with a strange light, the crystal pillars becoming sandstone ones further down the length of the bridge, wind slashed, carved snakes twisting around the bodies of the pillars, fragments of gold leaf still sticking on their once polished sandstone bodies. One time it was a bridge made of tattered black lace and old grey ribbons, the atmosphere the sepia colour of an old photograph, the lace body of the bridge like the last insistent fragment of a memory that wishes to disappear from the last mind still trying to hold it…I have dreamt of a bridge made of leather bound books, old yellowing paper and dry dust, the yellowing paper marked with letters of unknown alphabets, half erased sketches, and faded ink stains, a bridge made of stories so old that were dead and forgotten long before the oldest legends were born. I have dreamt of an origami bridge, endless sheets of paper folded, creased and pressed upon themselves, creating delicate arches festooned with more origami flowers and garlands of silver scissors. There was a bridge made of sea bitten wood, wrapped in rusty chains, old sea woes and laments spelled out with shells on the pillars, the muted shine of pearls humming the tune of promises eroded by salty tears. There was another made of bones joined with silver pins and wire, bead strings made of onyx and amethyst wrapped around the arches, spider silk banners hanging from the balustrades, old battles painted on them in purple ink. One was made of Legos, millions of colourful bricks assembled in intricately impossible ways, in ways that only exist in childhood imaginary landscapes that no Danish designer will ever walk again. Another made of black and grey smoke, a writhing bridge that was constantly moving but staying in place, the smoke smelling of thousands of burning spices. Still another was made of boiled sweets, all colours and shapes, a vast sweet mosaic of a bridge, supported by striped candy canes, the atmosphere smelling of sugar and rosewater and lemon and mint. And a bridge made of raindrops, shimmering in the light, wrapped in flashing rainbows.
There have been hundreds of bridges, each one distinct from the other but always the same bridge. There are never any people or live birds or animals. I can never see where the bridge ends, just where it starts. I cannot see if there is a river underneath, a deep gorge or a flaming sea. I am not sure if the bridge is anchored in the ground of just floating in the currents of my dreams. I am not sure what it is supposed to symbolise if dreams really are symbols of something. But I am sure of the lament that pervades the dream, the ancient longing of the wife of the master stonemason, built alive in the foundation of the bridge to make it stand, an innocent sacrifice to the gods, to pacify them for the hubris they feel men have committed in defying the obstacles they set to them.
Maybe I visit her dreams in my sleep, her half-forgotten images of her sort life, her eroded memories of what joy was, her love for the hand that laid the stones around her even as she was wishing them lifeless as the last stone was put in place, her angry bitterness at what was taken away from her, her understanding of why this cruelty is necessary to the order of the world and her desperate hope for a last minute salvation that never came and will never come. Maybe my dream bridge is her bridge, all the things that she never had the time to tell and never had the time to fully understand that assume the form of her prison grave and are let loose in dreamland for wandering dreamers to encounter. And the wonder and amazement they feel and the thought they may spare her is a small relief and a little balm to that eternal longing. I am not sure of were the bridge leads, whether it is a puzzle, an invitation or a trap. I have never dared to cross it…
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