A DREAM: Odessa, 1988 1. He sees in a dream the small town on the estuary where he worked the first few years following graduation, a resident physician at the regional hospital. He had left that place with few regrets. From time to time former patients would visit him-- fewer and less often over the years. In his dream the square in front of the new department store and the slope down to the bus station and the wharf are filled with a dressed-up, almost festive crowd. He walks, rubbernecking, seeking in vain even one familiar face. Here is the church, long converted for use as a furniture store; scattered in front of it are new but shoddy armchairs and sofas where old ladies in flowery, fringed babushkas sit. The womens' faces hold no expression, their gnarled brown hands rest on their knees; at the feet of each old lady is a basket of old junk-- around them crowd mocking, stylish teenagers. The women keep their peace. 2. While crossing the square he runs into his father who has gotten old, all worn out. His charcoal suit has probably seen better days; Father is unshaven, which for him is unprecedented. In his hand is a small briefcase containing a stethoscope and a nickel-plated reflex mallet. The dreamer is startled to realize that he himself is carrying an identical, or rather the same briefcase. Father says, "Well, you finally made it back. Congratulations!" The dreamer replies, "No congratulations necessary. Fifteen years of work-- all for nothing. I will be forty soon, you know, and already I don't have the energy to start from scratch. There must be some mistake." Father responds, "First--soon you will be seventy; second--the only solution is to start again from scratch; third--your mistake was in leaving this place." Then the dreamer feels a little shove against his chest; he rises slowly into the air above the heads of thousands of people, but only a single face is turned up to follow him. The small round dome, having flashed below, vanishes. He is surrounded by a dim, pale, faintly pulsing, cloudy shroud. Oh Lord, the years pass and already have passed when there is nothing left but to fall asleep lonely and to wake up weeping. © 1996 Boris Khersonsky. All rights reserved. Translation by Ruth Kreuzer and Dale Hobson.