I’m in a house in the suburbs. No one is there except for my pet eagle, whom I’ve neglected to visit and he’s not been let out of his cage in at least two weeks. The cage is too small and full of poop and he is all bunched up inside. The top of his head has been rubbed bald by the ceiling of the cage. At first, he kind of looks like a purple version of Sam the Eagle from The Muppets, except cute instead of scowly. And he’s so excited that I’m there, you know like how dogs quiver when they are trying to contain their excitement. I feel really guilty about not letting him out for too long so I take him out of his cage. Then, because the cage is so gross, I decide that no, someone had grown so disgusted with the smell that it had been cleaned recently. So now the cage is clean.

As I’m looking at him, I notice there is a strip of transparent tape on his forehead, with maybe two centimeters overlapping onto his eyeballs (he doesn’t have eyelids. They look like a stuffed animal’s - two big white ovals with blue irises and black pupils towards the bottom). So I am freaked out and want to get this tape off of his eyes, and I slowly and carefully begin to peel the tape back (imagine trying to remove a stamp without tearing or damaging it so you can re-use it on another envelope). But even though I’m being as careful as I can, the tape pulls a tiny tear in the side of his eyeball (kind of like if you had a slice of hardboiled egg and tore it a bit). And his eye begins to collapse a little like it is just a flat oval with nothing underneath.

I think, Okay, okay, this is a dream. I changed the cage I can fix his eye. But it doesn’t work. So I think, maybe if I stay calm, it won’t hurt him. Maybe in this dream it’s no big deal if your eyeball gets torn a little. So, I’m holding him cradled in my lap with one arm and with the other hand I am flipping through the Yellow Pages for the phone number of a vet. But as I’m looking I realize that I’m in the suburbs with no car and no public transportation. Even if I could call a cab, I have no money. I also have no carrier in which to transport him. He starts to fidget a little and I flip faster. Then he begins to struggle and I try to hold onto him so I can call the vet. I should have just let him go so I could make the phone call but in my dream I was afraid to, that he would die if I did. So now he is flapping his wings and his wingspan is like five feet across and I can’t hold him but I can’t call for help either. We’re both panicking and I know he’s going to die no matter what I do, but mostly I’m so sorry that he’s suffering so much because of me. Then I wake up.

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[Okay, firstly, the puns in my dream: the bald eagle and the "tear" (drop of water) in the eye; but secondly, the guilt over neglecting something that depends on me (or myself); thirdly, the danger of uncovering one’s eyes and how painful it can be and that what you ultimately see can overwhelm you; fourthly, the panic of trying to keep contained something that is wild and hurt and enormous (emotions); fifthly, inflicting pain on something you love; and lastly, the despair of having your attempts to save something thwarted by the something you’re trying to save.]