Tomorrow I will be
a full deck of cards.
I prefer only 8s.
No faces
face up or
face down.
Jokers don’t count
except when weeds
become wild
flowers on honeymoon.
I still pick up
my feet
when I walk—run
mile after mile
timing my way
into the moment
when time floats
off. When everything
before folds into
everything to come.
When endorphins
kick in
at any age,
and lake ice
winks at
the sinking sun.
run / hide / fight
the slow dance track plays
no one’s dancing
who remembers how
someone please
let’s build
a skyway to the moon
the weather between
here and there
can tire wings
bend fins
fray tails
someone please
turn off
the piped-in song
cut the bell’s tongue
someone please
let the buskers inside
we have a long way to go
let them sing
of views and the hand
that opens the cage
someone please
A light lilts over
wet roads, the grass
barely covered.
Slow moments,
fast ones, some
carving a channel between.
She doesn’t know which
she wants to set
the rhythm of her day.
It’s not just hers.
Not really hers at all. Gratitude
comes in shades of blue,
or is it green to gold.
Soon, so soon, too soon,
in the dark,
she can’t tell.
“The held breath of the world at 5 pm in winter.”
—Garth Risk Hallberg, City on Fire
She keeps her pockets empty.
Daylight is precious this time of year.
She keeps her pockets empty.
Driverless cars will give the unlicensed permission to feel.
She keeps her pockets empty.
Thick gloves interrupt her thoughts indoors.
She keeps her pockets empty.
The time has come to make room for winter.
She keeps her pockets empty.
A small bird chirps behind a tree trunk.
She keeps her pockets empty.
Everywhere else is too full the day after.
She keeps her pockets empty.
The wind slips through so easily.
She keeps her pockets empty.
The park reopens before dawn.
She keeps her pockets empty.
Some skylines regenerate like livers.
She keeps her pockets empty.
No kangaroo crosses her path or breaks her stride.
She keeps her pockets empty.
When an actor forgets his lines, she remembers how to scream.
She keeps her pockets empty.
Geocachers lose themselves inside a discovered letterbox.
She keeps her pockets empty
to make room for an exhale of visible breath.
what if
tonight’s full moon cracks
spills onto our tree branches
what if there is no moon
at all
ever again
what if an empty room
roars at double the decibels
of a packed music venue
and the voices
are all yours
what if what if
is eliminated
from our vocabulary
and the ?
becomes an earring
you lost years ago
all the answers
might tumble
off the shelf
when you open
the closet door
and the shape of hangers
will signify
our dismay
Check it out:
you can’t fake a fold
when you really crave a cut
or a curve
when wearing earbuds
in a cafe sounds like nonsense
to your unplugged ears
when you see a red sky
at night
not in the morning
when you don’t believe
in worshipping
any trinity
when you wish for a gale
but settle for an exhale
and a scream
from your false vocal folds
becomes the truth
Time to stop
memorizing erased lines.
Forget borders to red
and gold memories
of events
she didn’t experience.
No one did,
or no one’s admitting
anything. Brown
branches claw their way
through a charcoal sky
to the other side.
And she kisses drizzled air,
so relieved to live
where four seasons
dare to break through.
She keeps writing
the wrong year
at the top of blank pages.
The one before this one.
She faces a white wall.
Imagines climbing it
to come home. An ache
from the strain burns
deep inside her thighs.
A PJ Harvey song
floats through her.
She’s a poet now.
A strengthening wind
cuts a metallic sky.
A sickness coats every strand
of thought, patch
of skin. Longing spreads
in square feet
across the poorest fen
to her heart. The ruler
she measures it with
smells like black honey,
sounds like Chopin
vodka bottles being pulled
from a bed of ice.
Or nothing at all
like it—
nothing at all.
Set me on fire
to awaken dormant seeds
to a hidden life.
These trees do not tell
the truth
I can whisper to you.
I am my own invasive species
waiting to be reduced
to carbon and ash.
Someone tell me
where I can find the map
to my true water regime.
I wait in rushes
for the right one
to unroll at my feet.
The one that will lead
to a mire
native to my heart.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 