Will drink the new wine. The only conversation
I’ll have this weekend
is with you. If
erythrophobia was fatal, you would have been
a serial killer. Or was it just me?
Not yet vintage, I wanted to be
your only victim. A true enough
kiss to taste the tobacco
before it became my own. I long
to be the person again
who comes along
to stir yours. Though I can’t lick
your ghostly replies, the scent is rich
in pre-fall burning. Hold the leaves.
I enter the quiet
life through a seam
in this wall. First time I heard
your voice was a homecoming. Tell me
if ghosts speak. With a pronounced
accent? Is the language
of flowers reserved for them
the way I’ve reserved myself
for what’s left
of you? Memory is seamless.
Close enough is never enough
to align your hips
with my waist
no matter how long I ride
this train going south. I overshoot
the dream by a zone
or two. It’s up to me
to make adjustments. In your permanent
state—you won’t budge. But
weather is everywhere—weather is
god. I am everywhere wondering where
you’ve gone to weather god.
The poetry’s in
the unconsummation
and this latitude
we almost finally share.
Only you could get away
with that haircut—you
really didn’t. If I met your brother
in a hallway or on a baseball field
would I see your face, hear your deeply accented
laugh, touch that beard
you shaved off
too soon? Would he know
why this stranger observes
his every move? I continue
to risk being
misunderstood for one of those
moments we used to share before
gravity and all other laws overtook us.
Tonight
Noguchi saves
all of us from those fears
we nourish in our souls before
morning.
For MJN crossing beneath,
for NYC connecting across,
for The Brooklyn Bridge rescue working destiny
Advance your vantage
point, collapse
your facade of steel,
your gutted concrete floor.
Collide your bridge maker
with mine, collage your hand over mouth
with my eyes shut,
vocal chords in strangulation—
a scream
a void
to coalesce to convalesce
on one promenade
of material unidentifiable yet.
Coordinate the crossing—
bare feet
dust
ash caked faces
no veil could protect,
suits meaningless, ties undone
till they become arms swaying.
A human chain
of events. A human
behavior changing—
never
no way
when
now.
They designed bridges
to be passageways.
Make them good
to get no further
than this. It is still where it has been,
the destination stands
between these pedestrian elevating towers
still here.
One stop
sign, two
spritzes of rosewater, three
sips of iced mint
tea, four
acoustic guitar tunes, five
kisses on the lips—we
almost got away with a sixth.
I still live
in a coin operated
world. These social networking
tricks do not align
with how I shrink
from true human
contact when the moon begins
to count. If he kept the letters
I wrote, where would they be
now? Hearts bought
at estate sales
are non-refundable.
What was once a blush
you so eagerly sought
to induce has become
a flush
into my middle
age. The gap has been shrinking
steadily for nine years. I hope to catch
you in another nine. Grief—nothing
embarrassing about it.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 