Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

In Robert Creeley’s “The Dream (2),” the poet ventures into surreal imagery that taps into the subconscious, mixing themes of repression, desire, and existential suffocation. The poem begins with an unusual image: “A lake in the head / wherein they put a boat,” a scene that suggests an imaginative or dreamlike state, where thoughts and symbols float and drift like a boat on water. The lake may symbolize the mind itself, a reservoir for thoughts and dreams. This mental landscape becomes a space of exploration, as indicated by the two men in the boat, who are described as “trousered,” grounding them in a mundane, perhaps restrained, reality.

The next stanza introduces a contrasting image of “women go in swimming / in the nude,” an expression of freedom, sensuality, and perhaps transgression. The line “They blossom into lewd” suggests a transformation from innocence to something more provocative or forbidden, a natural yet socially taboo shift that evokes a tension between societal norms and hidden desires. In this dreamscape, the women’s freedom and nudity create a contrast to the men’s clothed, controlled presence. The words “blossom into lewd” imply a natural unfolding, as though lewdness or sexuality is an inherent, organic part of being that simply emerges in the right environment.

The final stanza, “That light shut off, / he rolls over / and under, / begins to smother,” brings a sense of claustrophobia and perhaps the abrupt end of the dream. The “light shut off” might signify a return to consciousness or the closing down of this mental space of exploration, as if self-awareness or societal constraints have intruded upon the freedom experienced in the dream. Rolling “over and under” conveys a sense of being overwhelmed, while “begins to smother” suggests suppression, as though these thoughts or desires are suffocating under the weight of repression.

Creeley’s poem, though short, uses vivid and unsettling imagery to explore the tension between desire and restraint, and between the conscious self and the subconscious mind. The lake in the head becomes a space for expression that is ultimately shut down, leaving the speaker in a state of suffocation. In this way, “The Dream (2)” captures the haunting feeling of desires that surface in dreams but must be repressed upon waking, leaving an imprint of what remains unexpressed and unresolved.

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