"Do not fall asleep in your enemy's dream"
-John Edgar Wideman
There are dreams that heal—and dreams that imprison.
Not all visions of peace are meant for our liberation.
Not all invitations to rest are safe.
To fall asleep in your enemy’s dream is to mistake sedation for sanctuary.
Empire dreams of obedience.
Capital dreams of consumption.
Patriarchy dreams of silence.
White supremacy dreams of order.
These dreams are seductive. They offer comfort in exchange for complicity, visibility in exchange for performance, but what is the cost of dreaming someone else’s dream?
The dream of the enemy is always a containment—a way to fold you into their order, their comfort, their mythologies of peace and progress. It may look like success. It may feel like luxury. But if it demands your erasure—your voice, your history, your people, it is not safety. It is surrender.
So do not fall asleep.
Stay awake. Stay wild.
Dream dreams of your own.
Dream of worlds the enemy cannot map.
Of futures that cannot be co-opted.
Of identities that do not beg to be included in broken systems.
Rest is not the enemy—but dreaming with the enemy is, so stay awake so you can build while others sleep. So you can resist the lullaby of empire, and write new songs entirely.