Nightmare fumes around my face like camphor in a sac. Your shoes are open graves I stumble on. your socks, dead birds to gather up. This is the bottleneck. With every breath I draw, the rings constrict. beside me in the bed you're like a third rail, rigid with current. I listen to your mutterings, sort through the gibberish for signs. You thrash, cry out, wrestle with the sheet. Underneath the El, the house shakes… I dream my mother's dream from my grandmother's bed: the eels are all escaping from the kitchen sink… A blue volt wracks the sky arcing you awake. Our eyes meet. the light fails. We plunge through tunnels pitched headlong. Brakes squeal like pigs.