For Steve
Because there would be
no next time
around, she chooses to listen
to Nick Drake, Sandy Denny, Joy
Division the way he would have wished
if he still could.
Night Poems
Shall We Dance?
For Steve and Colin
We three who sit in a tattered, sprung black
booth on the non-music side
ask
ourselves this. The confusion—
liver or lives, ecstasy
from a handful of pills or arms
dropping
from an invisible burden. It would kill
off two, would leave
the third alone
to hold the hollows
of an answer together
with her own hug
she wraps around herself.
A Seasonal Man
For Steve
A spring rain
essence hangs in the air
on a Saturday morning
in October, triggers memories
of any season
up for grabs. We hunt for rats
in the NYC subway,
on its streets, behind
its garbage bins
in alleys. Summer in the City
always makes a statement
to the nose. Bad
puns and monotony
breaking drinks to keep us
warm on a Minnesota winter
night. I came unprepared. You
had no idea what you were
getting yourself into—out of.
On the west bank
of the Saint Croix,
we read through
all I had written
come spring. It came
so violently, I almost faded
dead away
by my own hand. Was it yours
that crossed out
the almost
18 years later—the slow
desperation of a soul dying
to be free.
Gro
For Steve
I believe—I don’t
know when—I believe
I will come to accept the world
without you in it. Not there
yet. Nightly haunting of our nightly haunts
awakens me
to these sad refusals and you
not there.
Last Night
For Steve
I can’t find you
on the northwest side
of this urban courtyard
without knowing true
north or any other kind
of truth—save you
are too soon gone.
Into this Autumnal Equinox
This rain may mute
the full moon tonight,
may turn my thoughts to wet
brain, incurable
delusion, doubt, immobility.
I cannot blame
those clouds or any weather
pattern for this disease
of selfish, vicious obsession. It fights
back by sitting in wait
to rot my body—power
greater than myself. I won’t decay
today, will walk into spitting
wind to become present
inside a drop of cannot know.
Garbled
When her grandfather paid her
a nickel for each half
hour she could sit still
and mute
neither could know how
her father’s words would evaporate
into close Jersey shore air
for free, how the other capital A
disease untreated might do the same
to a friend she can’t bear to be near—
and stillness becomes
permanent. Even if
she kept those nickels
all these years, she couldn’t purchase
a reprieve
from either for anyone.
On this Day in 1995: A Prose Poem?
Warning: Sentimentality Ahead
In honor of the 15th anniversary of Trace’s official release today, I decided to listen to the entire album while walking along the West Bank of the Mississippi River. I walked from downtown Minneapolis to the river and along the pedestrian path—which hovers between the river and the Great River Road (Highway 61)—to the Broadway Bridge in the time it takes to listen to all the songs through “Too Early.” “Mystifies Me” played as I turned back and started heading south. I did make a brief detour on a trail that loops to the water’s edge for “Out of the Picture.” With the band members residing all along the Mississippi River at the time the album was recorded, from the Minneapolis area to the Saint Louis area to (temporarily) New Orleans, I have always associated the album with the river.
Trace may have been released 15 years ago today, but I’ll never forget hearing the songs for the first time on a leaked tape cassette that was circulating in early 1995 and the first time I saw the band play at the 7th Street Entry on a warm June night. I stood in the front row and have done my best to maintain that position ever since. When I listen to those songs, I feel as if they’ve been around my whole life. “Sounds like 1963” indeed. Isn’t that the definition of classic?
No collection of songs has had such a presence in my life. I believe that generations down the road, or up the river, will listen to Trace (on whatever contraption is prevalent at the time) and become just as enchanted with the songs’ beauty, sadness, grit, and wisdom. Trace is a best friend, a classic, a poem, a prayer. And “the rhythm of the river will remain.”
The Depot
A young man in a loud
print shirt, baggy shorts, flip
flops, makes
a balance beam
from a track rail. Records
a freight train’s flight
through the station
to replay and give false hope to future
passengers dodging bats
passing under the eaves. Lights
from boats on moonlight
excursions and the Harbor
Bar across the channel
on the island with no name
transform the river
into a stage. Others wait
to travel west:
White Fish, Montana,
Portland, Oregon,
Chico, California,
eventually. For me, the waiting
will be longer than the journey home.
Inherit This
“Soaked in the blood and black of thousands of dead bugs. We smelled our clothes deeply.”
—Jack Kerouac, On the Road
What color
is your blood, she asks
her grandmother instinctively.
The answer comes on strong
as a tall shot
of Polish vodka: black. Absence
or all wavelengths of light,
it’s so hard to tell
in this reflection against skin.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 