This man is dead

In the past week, I’ve had two dreams that were interrupted by the unusual dream that follows. In the first occurrence, I am walking through a field that might be a golf course or a country meadow. I am with someone: a friend. To our right, we see a large tent or canvas shelter like one might find at a county fair. We walk to the tent in silence and go in. The tent is empty except for a large-screen television at one end. There are no chairs or people, nor is there any rational explanation for this lone tent and its television.
My friend and I approach the television. The program is “Inside the Actors Studio,” and James Lipton is interviewing Burt Reynolds. The picture is washed out and grainy, while the sound is weak with too much bass as if I’m listening from inside a large plastic bubble.
After a moment, the program shifts to what seems to be a movie trailer for a movie called “Agnes of God: The Fifth Book.” At this point, the dream becomes massively more vivid and realistic. The sounds are clear and crisp and the picture is as lifelike as a magazine photo. Or more so. The title screen fades to reveal a scene with two nuns and a monk in the loft that I remember from the movie “Agnes of God,” which I saw in about 1986. Burt Reynolds plays the monk.
Now, I’m no longer in the tent watching a television but in the loft itself. I can smell the straw on the floor. I can see the Quebec countryside stretching to the treed horizon. Before me, bent over a tall table or alter, is a dead body. I know it is dead by the ashen skin and toneless muscle. The monk reaches across a rustic wooden railing that separates him from the body and lifts the upper body, revealing the face and torso—the unmistakable face and body of the crucified Jesus. I can see His purple-black bruises from the thorns, the abrasions on His cheeks and nose, the sword wound below His ribcage, the bruised and scraped knees, and the purple, swollen, and torn wrists.
The monk releases the body, but it does not fall back onto the table. Instead, it rests back against the railing, arms stretched wide as on the cross, head lolling lifelessly to the right, eyes dead and open. The monk, calm but concerned, says to no one in particular, “This man is dead. Why do I not know this man?”
Jesus slowly raises His head, not to the monk, but directly to me. His cadaver eyes stare emotionlessly into mine, and he says, “But I know you. I have known you always.”
I think the dream ends there. At least, that’s all I remember. I woke up sweating and with my heart was beating rapidly—not scared so much as shocked. The two recurrences of the dream vary only in their preambles. (The second dream takes place in a gas station with a different friend. I see the trailer playing on the screen of an ATM.) The movie trailers are identical in both dreams. It is as if the trailer hijacked my real dreams, superimposing itself into my sub-conscience.
These dreams occurred in July of 2002 and have not recurred—at least I don’t remember having them again. But I have thought about them many times since. I have searched for answer and sought advice from friends. Ultimately, I know that the answer has been before me all the time, yet I have refused to acknowledge it. I still do.

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September 11, 2002 · Filed Under Latest

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