Dreams Will Never Lie Poem by gershon hepner

His father's favorite, he received
a many-colored coat,
interpreting what none believed,
his dreams which made him gloat,
predicting greatness for himself.
His brothers said: “Resist! ”
and tried to put him on a shelf:
“He surely won't be missed.”
There was no shelf, but in a pit
they threw him, without pity,
tore off his coat and bloodied it––
the mess was hardly pretty.
With Schadenfreude they observed
as each one took a pot-shot,
which he hubristically deserved
for acting as a hot-shot.

They sold him, telling his old dad
wild beasts tore him to pieces,
which made the old man very sad––
only death releases
our sorrow, near-death brings a warning
that we intercept.
The coat made him declare: “Some wild,
wild creatures must have torn
my favorite, extra special child.”
Quite frantic and forlorn,
he half believed his son had died,
as piously they’d preached,
though lawyerly they never lied
and couldn’t be impeached,
but in his heart of hearts he knew,
against the evidence
his own eyes saw: “It can’t be true––
his dying makes no sense.”

They were dead wrong of course, to use
a coat as evidence,
like prosecutors who accuse
a man, at great expense,
of having spilled his seed upon
a bimbo's dress from Gap
as if he were a common john
consorting with a JAP,
as happened in the USA:
the President survived,
like Joseph in his hideaway,
and when the ten arrived
to buy the family some grain
their brother did not gloat;
he was too noble to complain
about an overcoat.

Of course, he hadn’t lost his life,
but working as a slave
found sex harassment by the wife
of Potiphar most grave,
and when she also seized his coat
he said: “I cannot lie
with you, because I am no goat, ”
and chose from her to fly,
refusing to assuage her lust––
it went against his conscience.
It would have been abuse of trust,
so he preferred the dungeons
where he interpreted the dreams
of his two royal cellies,
and Pharaoh’s too, in which it seems
in thin cows' bloated bellies
lay fat cows, meaning that a famine
would follow fertile years,
champagne with caviar, smoked salmon
washed down by bitter tears.
And so the favorite son became
prime minister of Pharaoh,
in Egypt having great acclaim
downtown, the king of Cairo.

His brothers knew not who he was––
he put on a disguise,
and scared them all to death because
he claimed that they were spies.
He planted on the youngest one
a goblet that he claimed
was stolen, till he felt he’d won
respect from those who’d shamed
the man at home, and then forgave
all ten for harm they'd done,
explaining he was there to save
his rivals, every one,
his father, too, inviting them
to emigrate, emotion
concealed, refusing to condemn
the guilty once in Goshen.

They all lived happily thereafter
because his dreams came true,
though later tears would follow laughter
and slavery ensue,
but that's a story which does not
come true till they all die,
because the victim of the plot
had dreams that did not lie.

1/15/2001,4/1/04,12/16/05,4/19/07