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A dream in which a butterfly crashes
through a stone wall is a warning
that you are no longer immune to flattery.
To dream that you are asleep means you will
soon receive gifts from people you detest.
To be told you often cackle loudly in your sleep
means you are not a Master of Indifference.
A dream of rotten cactus signifies
that you have somehow offended the dead.
To receive an invitation in a dream
is the mark of an intelligent dreamer.
Short dreams are the dear price of a hectic life,
long dreams no compensation for a dull one.
To dream you are taller than usual
indicates that you are not very healthy
and may soon be attacked.
Following a dream in which someone empties
his pipe by tapping it against your forehead,
leave your bed and run, flee your house,
your village, never to return again.
Any dream that is a foe of sympathy
is not a source of magic.
When a dream's music is sweet,
give all you own to the poor;
when it is harsh, leave all you own
on the doorsteps of the rich.
Then, in either case, you must flee
your home, your village,
never to return again.
A dream of lambs bounding over rainbows:
this is where the songs of fiends arise.
Even to Artemidorus, a dream
of eating uncooked corn
does not easily reveal its secret.
If you dream your house is full
of jovial foreigners, imperturbable,
look-alike heathens
who speak an incomprehensible tongue
and who refuse to leave
no matter how many gifts you throw at them,
then when you wake
know that there will be beauty
all around you, peace within your heart,
? before you must quietly depart,
forsaking your house, your village,
never to return again.
But if dreaming your way
through your own house,
or any familiar place, you open
a cabinet or door
that you, somehow, never noticed before,
and enter a room or a corridor
that leads to another,
and yet another,
and you find yourself
not in a parlous maze
but a maze of openings, exploring
an expanding mansion
that must have been there all along,
Then you should welcome these dreams
as their blooming enjambment
welcomes you,...