Inspiration for the photograph, Eating the sun

Inspiration for photograph, “Eating the Sun”

In the dream it was Saturday and I had gotten up early to clean my apartment.

I heard the slow, plunk…plunk…of the dripping faucet in the kitchen.

I glanced ahead toward the doorway and saw something sitting at the kitchen table.

My mop crashed to the floor.

Slowly the creature turned toward me.

I froze.

On top of a pair of pink, fleshly human shoulders was the head and neck of a deer. Growing out of its head was a huge tangle of antlers that cast a dark shape across the kitchen table.

I pinched my eyes shut, then forced them open.

Beneath the table were its two hairy legs, donning blue cotton jockey shorts with yellow stars painted all over them. Human hands rested over the bare knees. Its hairy chest had flat breasts and I assumed that, whatever it was, it was male. And the way he sat, with his back so straight and erect, gave me the impression that this was someone of stature.

I sucked in a big breath and forced myself to walk into the kitchen. One of the chairs was close and I took hold of the back, pulling myself down into the seat. I then pressed my hands flat on the table.

Slowly, the creature turned and blinked its big brown eyes at me.

The hairs on my arms stood on end.

A charge was coming from this figure—its mass a ball of energy.

Nervously my eyes slipped to the rust colored fur on its neck. Though coarse, his coat was not at all mangled or torn like on some animal living in the wild, it appeared groomed and he seemed almost regal.

Then I noticed the uncanny serenity about the creature. Maybe it was the way it sat so tall and yet relaxed that it brought to mind the hushed stillness of a rock. Something solid. Eternal. Like a René Magritte painting of a giant boulder filling my kitchen. Whatever it was, it seemed perfectly comfortable being in my kitchen and not in the forest. And my being there was okay, too.

I began to feel a certain tenderness for the creature. (It had the innocence of a fawn I had met on my brother’s farm… one so tame that it leaned into my chin and let me hold it.)

I settled back into my chair.

I have no idea why, but I sniffed the air. Then I started sobbing, not from sadness, but from joy.

I shot up in bed, still half asleep, muttered, “I just met God.”