Fuel leaks out
all over the tarmac
beneath the left wing.
Sandbags. Fire trucks.
Another night
in Austin. Back home
it’s still snowing.
Overnight Poems
Eight Months
While dreaming,
our number
transforms into
a symbol
that gives
permission to go
on forever. One
sprawling figure
eight
through the seasons. But
it turns out
8 is not ∞
You have stopped
counting as I build momentum.
Grief can’t be quantified.
I must resort
to art as I carry you
with me on and off
the trace.
Flash Memoir
“Anonymity is priceless.”
—Jay Farrar, Falling Cars and Junkyard Dogs
At the half
century mark, debris stops
falling long
enough for her
to see stars. Suddenly
she believes
in the power of the speed
of light to guide her
to a place
that needs
no name. Familiar
faces remain
intact. And another
song becomes
a homecoming
she didn’t realize
she was
craving in her sleep.
Fake Book
Rumors of notes
divided up—a settlement
made behind closed trap
doors. Illegal bindings
can lead to the tightest bonds
and rhythm section. Whatever
you call it—maybe true
love—spills forth
where the mapping leaves off.
Another One for the First City I Loved
Swan boats
Arthur Fiedler
Logan Sumner Tunnel
The Phoenix Newbury Comics
Fenway
Cold Water (April 14)
Maiden. She sank 101 years ago today,
or had started to sink. My father taught me
how to swim in a bay
off a rocky beach. He taught me
how to tie my shoes on porch steps
that spilled onto those rocks—though he said
I taught myself. I never sank
all the way to the bottom.
I’ve always managed to swim
ashore. So many to thank. I could not
have done it by myself.
Twisted Anniversary
Twenty years ago when she thought she would live
forever, she tried to cut it
short. Twenty years later, she’s doing all she can
to preserve each daily miracle. Joy
Division was rattling in
her head: “She’s Lost Control.” Who knows what
the Roadhouse jukebox
was pumping out. It was Neil Young who awakened her
with a “Harvest Moon”
in April to a morning she didn’t know she would want
to know. Some dates are best
forgotten. She’s the lucky one who gets to remember the long play.
Is It Mine Again?
Dumptruck sings “Get off
my island.” Used to be
my refrain even though
I’ve always known no one
(especially me) can really own
it. Just missed going to college
with one Dumptrucker. Shared a cab
from the Lower East Side to Prospect Heights
early one Sunday morning with another.
An oral history gets written
down. What gets lost
in translation becomes ghost
poems that only recite
themselves under waxing
crescent moons. But when they do,
you can hear them echo
up freshly rained-on empty streets
with titles like “urban spring” and “long live
the lighthouse keeper.”
Now She’s Done It
“I wish I could speak sky.”
—Richard Hell (“Boy Meets Death, Boy Falls in Love” in Hot and Cold)
And still a shadowy figure
and steady footsteps stamping the rain
behind me cause trouble. I must retire
from this life before
it retires me. Says the old one, says
who. Five o’clock on a Friday flows
in both directions—make it three,
four, more. I see
the water sculpture gain
momentum as it spills off
the edge of a tower
atrium balcony. They move
waterfalls on rivers
as famous as the Mississippi
and others you can’t name too. What
should I do
with you now? Hot and cold. I flip
through it in a crowded Starbucks—sketched
penises fly by. And you—naked
on one page. I can’t stop
to stare/admire you/it.
In a crowded Starbucks.
That’s what I get
for pulling you out
here—for taking in
my daily double shot
espresso in a crowded Starbucks
in the first place. The last place
would be where a stranger refuses
to pass me.
Wise Disguise
The way a punk
unravels slowly,
then zap—nothing left
save the recovered voice
of a city transient. Or, a dead
man wrapped in stray
dog’s fur. Or,
poems spilling
red over black.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 