The corner where two
windows meet. The view
from a dark room
onto a fog-dampened
night. Stories
dissolve when they hit
pavement, or never get exposed
to atmosphere at all. It stings
to be so poised
to burst forth
in a voice soft
and deep, but to be
the one holding back
exquisite blackness
with a candle flame
that laps up
fear and air
till someone’s lover
returns. A woman’s true
laughter will float on
still water
to break through
soot and other romantic
toxins falling out.
In my dream the dead console
the living about others
who may have died. Rumors
turn a 60s ranch brick house
into a warren of hidden
phobias—a different one
for each room. Fear of
wool, not cotton wool, brings her
to the farthest corner
of the cellar where a sneeze
is just a sneeze. And it is you,
my dear friend, who are really gone.
That other friend left
my life but lives on
in another warren on another island
with his superconductors and scattering waves.
A picture falls
off the wall
in my dream. Nothing
breaks. No explanation
necessary in my dream. The room
changes shape. Misaligned
pelvis or sacrum
or love
of lighthouses
could cause this
pain felt when awake. In my
dream, numb and suspended
and just
out of reach.
A noisy smell
only she detects
keeps her awake
past her favorite dream
exits. A sweet hammer
pounds on a pungent
nail head. A commotion
echoes in the alley
of her mind. No sirens
just a window opened
against the rules
on an almost
November night.
Untamed or unnamed, the tilt is in
her head—and a lock shuts
down forever to stop
the spread of invasive
species up
river. Forever is
a long time to fight the ambitions
of fish. She’ll find the way
to unburden her own.
Someone says snow.
It won’t. I won’t
let this happen–
this death
to birds that don’t
fly through glass. I used to
say I love water
skiing. Have only done it
twice. A lake
in Ohio. Not the big one.
It’s not that I can’t breathe
bilaterally. I just haven’t tried
in years. Superior, Michigan,
Huron, Erie, Ontario. There,
I said them fast
enough almost to forget
there’s no salt
on my lips.
What I saw is a secret.
In whispers, I must only hint at
a northern Rimrock ridge,
a chain of snow-capped mountains called Beartooth,
unnaturally drawn carvings into a landscape from plane view
I could not identify,
irrigation ditches said the gentle guide at road level,
a canal where I would go
the last morning to pray,
the only way I know how.
Monday morning on my feet snaking a bicycle wheel-wide path
without falling, out of practice, forgetting the verses,
all the pauses and kneeling that must be choreographed just so
till I see what I must only whisper,
till I can take my trail mass to his bedside,
tell him louder than Roman chants
that I ran along his altar,
was trailing after him one more time,
while he rested half a lifetime of roads
into the quietest missal you can read
only if you close your eyes to hear,
your ears to see.
It is a secret
I must whisper. Two nights ago
with your hand tight around mine,
your breath tight around time,
yelling with lips through which nothing comes,
defying you to give me more road,
more trail you have in you than a mere cartographer,
to unfold before me,
whether or not I will be able to fold it up flat again.
I must only whisper
how the ridge and the ditches and the sky captivate,
can only whisper
how you, my father, must not die tonight,
can only whisper what you see, have seen,
I saw, am seeing—
this secret Big Sky.
Steam doesn’t rise
the way she dreamed
when she could
remember to watch
for it. Infrasound below
a register she recognizes
could still
cause a syndrome
or vibration
or jarring
thought to be
released into wind
bursting overnight.
Left leaning
too much spiral
not enough straight
on till dawn. Or,
at least till
the wooded trail breaks
onto a field
of heather
and black-eyed Susans.
The voice behind
the motion
will not reveal itself. Maybe
its body (if it has one)
will heal
faster incognito.
Always gives
her pause. She starts
and stops love
affairs on summer ones. That young
man who touches her
hair and cheek
in a dream she had
on this month’s 12th
has nothing
to do with her
imagination. And the green fairy
isn’t always green. She knows this
without taking a sip.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 